Lord Of The Guys
by quiffed
Summary: This is... Lord of the Flies, except with boysex instead of killing. A reality TV show, except with the Marauders instead of B-list celebrities. A WIP. And you get to vote on what happens next. It's just that cool.
1. In Which They Arrive On The Island

**Lord Of The Guys: The First Installment**

Sirius woke up one morning with the mother of all hangovers. That is, if the mother of all hangovers had gone to a boot camp and trained for a year and a day to become the most hung-over hangover in existence, and during its time there cultivated a deep dislike for several things, including sunlight, noise, and the absence of pain. For some inexplicable reason wherever it was Sirius was waking up was extremely bright and noisy. That, and there was a determined _squawking_ from somewhere above his head. Sirius moaned something unintelligible by way of a threat: if he had the energy, he'd give whatever it was _something_ to squawk about.

Sirius gagged, trying to rid his mouth of the awful taste it contained. His tongue felt swollen, dry as a bone, and very much like something covered in sand had died on it during the night. He cracked an eye open, wincing at the harsh glare of the sun, and squinted down at his tongue. It was, indeed, covered with sand. Sirius looked down at himself in consternation. He too, was covered in sand. In fact, he was surrounded by sand. This was because he was lying on a sandy white beach, with turquoise waves crashing onto the shore, and parrots with feathers too gaudy to look at for more than a few seconds soaring in the sky above him.

"Fuck!" Sirius exclaimed, and then wished he hadn't. The noise didn't just jar horribly in his aching brain, it also startled a flock of bloody evil feathered buggers parrots in the palm tree a few metres away that immediately started shrieking in unbridled delight.

"Fuck," Sirius whimpered quietly, cradling his head in his hands.

James found Remus standing in the shade of a tall palm tree, smoking a cigarette and studying his bitten fingernails with vague interest. When Remus heard James approaching, he looked up, pleasant surprise written all over his face. James's face was ashen, his hair was a chaotic mess of twigs, gel and sand (although admittedly if the sand wasn't there, it would look quite normal for James), and he was only wearing his Hogwarts blazer, red boxer shorts, and glasses (which were making a bid for escape by sliding down the side of his face and trying to jump off his right ear).

"Hello," Remus said calmly, stubbing out his cigarette on the tree bark. "Can we go home now?"

James stared at Remus. Remus gazed back at him thoughtfully. James took a wobbly step forward, then fell to his knees and was violently sick on a wrinkled green turtle basking in the hot sun nearby. Remus sighed.

Peter had been having the time of his life, splashing around in the rock pool with the complete and utter ecstasy of the Englishman who suddenly finds himself in a more tolerable climate (the climate of any other country in the world). He had been having the time of his life, that is, until the family of crabs that resided there had decided that they didn't particularly _want_ grubby naked feet disturbing their tranquil habitat. They attacked his big toe in a fury, causing him to howl with pain and hop up and down comically, which enraged the crustaceans even more. He'd tried to stamp on them and smash their shells then, but they'd been too quick, and the daddy crab had scuttled round and sliced his ankles, whilst the babies nipped at his toes. Peter had been forced to retreat to the side of the pool, where he nursed his cut feet and glared with hate at the crabs scuttling about self-righteously in the shallow water. They'd _started_ it, he hadn't done _anything_ wrong. Peter racked his brains and tried to think of a revenge that would be suitably fitting for animals that were not only clearly _evil_, but walked sideways.

Remus found Peter, pyjama bottoms round his ankles, urinating into a rock pool. He was very red in the face, and seemed to be mouthing the words 'Serves you little fuckers right'. Remus glanced at James to see what _he_ made of this, but the dark-haired boy only made a face which suggested he was about to throw up again, and shielded his eyes. Remus cleared his throat, and Peter spun round, startled.

"It's all their fault!" He insisted vehemently, seeing Remus's wide eyes and James's nauseated expression. "That big one, he _bit_ me! Prongs, Moony, he _bit_ me out of spite and I didn't do _anything_!" Peter indicated a shallow cut on his heel, eyes bugging slightly in rage. "You guys… you have to believe me!"

"I believe you," Remus said wearily, feeling in his pocket for another cigarette. "Pete, for Christ's sake, pull your trousers up."

By the time they found Sirius, curled up on a beach in the foetal position, James had vomited two more times, (the last time it had been on Remus's shoes), and Peter was _still_ talking to anyone who wouldn't listen about the crabs.

"They're a fucking menace to society," Peter was scowling. "I'm bleeding all over now – well, not bleeding exactly, but you can _see_ the blood, kind of inside the cut, can't you? And it hurts like anything…"

"I thought I was dreaming, when I woke up, y'know?" James moaned. Remus was trying to drag him along, keep him upright, and point his head in Peter's vague direction so his shoes wouldn't suffer if James puked again. "The only reason I knew I wasn't was that I felt like shit, and Evans wasn't lying next to me in a coconut bra."

Remus did not comment on this.

"Isn't that Sirius?" James mumbled suddenly. He wrenched himself free of Remus's grip and started to blunder towards him, lurching dangerously from side to side. "Mate! Oi! Padfoot!"

Sirius looked up and saw James hurrying towards him. He put a finger to his lips, and shook his head from side to side slowly (if he shook any faster, he thought his brain might explode).

"Quiet," he croaked softly. "Please."

"SIRIUS!" James yelled, and flung his arms around his best friend. Sirius cringed at the noise, but allowed himself to be hugged, sitting there limply. He grinned weakly at Remus over James's shoulder, flashing his white teeth.

"Hi," Sirius nodded. Remus glared.

"This is your fault."

"Why is it always _my_ fault?"

"Prongs is paralytic, Wormtail was found doing unspeakable things to crabs, and we're stuck on what seems to be a desert island. This _must_ be your fault."

"It probably is my fault," Sirius agreed. He tried to think back to the previous night, but it hurt too much, so he stopped and beamed up at Remus charmingly. "I can't really remember doing anything, though."

"You can't _remember_?" Remus asked in disbelief. He cast a look at Peter, who was sitting in the sand, muttering darkly. James was slumped over Sirius's shoulder, looking faintly green. Sirius pouted.

"What about you, what do you remember?"

"Look, I remember…" Remus thought. He couldn't remember that much, actually. The heat was going to his head. "I remember going to the library after dinner yesterday, to study for the Arithmancy test."

"And then?" Sirius asked, eyebrows raised. Remus made a 'Shove-off-you-wanker-this-is-all-your-f ault' face and played with a loose thread at the sleeve of his jumper.

"And then I don't remember anything else," he scowled. "I must've dozed off, I woke up under a palm tree, and I naturally assumed this was one of your stupid pranks."

"It'd have to be a pretty elaborate prank," Sirius murmured, patting a groaning James sympathetically on the back. "You know what, I'm starving. Accio breakfast, eh?"

James complied. Having already emptied his stomach of the previous day's dinner, lunch and mid-morning snack, he vomited down Sirius's back what he'd had for brekkie the day before. Eggs. Scrambled ones, although that little distinction hardly mattered now. Sirius shuddered in disgust, and the corners of Remus's mouth twitched slightly. James slid onto the sand, muttering half-hearted apologies.

"And that's another thing," Remus went on briskly, as Sirius removed his damp and sick-stained black shirt. "None of us have our wands. Peter's in his pyjamas, and James is – well. I don't have mine, I left it in the dorm, so unless you…"

"Unless I what?" Remus had trailed off, and was staring at Sirius's bare chest with an odd expression.

"Unless you have a wand," Peter supplied helpfully, from where he was sucking his sore toes with gusto. He really was amazingly flexible for someone so pale and podgy.

"No, I don't," Sirius answered, scratching the skin beneath his navel lazily and distracting Remus even more. "But I've just thought – do you think we're alone here? We should search the island. Maybe there's someone else here too, with a wand. Maybe they brought us here, so we could, erm, be here. Get tans. Eat coconuts. And then go home."

"I suppose that's not wholly improbable," Remus mused. Sirius scrambled to his feet.

"I am, naturally, the greatest genius that ever lived." He noticed Remus's scathing expression, and decided not to exaggerate just yet. "Well, apart from the fellow who thought up the Dungbomb."

"And the inventor of the racing broom," James contributed weakly.

"You want to leave these two alone together?" Remus asked in disbelief. "One of them seems hell-bent on regurgitating every thing he's eaten since third year, and the other's mouth is full of _toenail_." A crunching sound from Peter confirmed this.

"I'll look after him. We'll be all righ'," he mumbled, from behind his left foot. Sirius rubbed his forehead with the back of his hand and grinned triumphantly.

"See? They'll be fine," he assured Remus, starting to stride confidently towards the trees, across the hot sand. "Trust me."

**Who should be on the island with the Marauders? (Poll Closed)**

**Snape.  
Lily.  
Snape and Lily.  
Regulus or Bellatrix.  
Other people/combinations. (Please specify.)**


	2. In Which The Marauders Realise They Are ...

**Lord Of The Guys: The Second Installment**

Remus had privately decided, after spending only twenty or so minutes on it, that he and the island weren't really _gelling_. As Remus was, if nothing else, eminently sensible, knew that first impressions were often wildly inaccurate. For instance, the first time he'd laid eyes on James, the boy had been sitting alone on the Hogwarts Express, dark hair combed back neatly, studiously reading through his round glasses, utterly absorbed. Feeling that this indeed was a kindred spirit, Remus had decided it was safe to share a carriage (and, later, the sandwiches his mum had packed) with him. Remus had later learned that the only reason James's hair didn't resemble the nest of a slightly schizophrenic bird on the first day of school was because Mrs Potter had used a semi-permanent Flattening Charm on it, and the thing he'd been looking at so avidly was a _Zonko's_ order form. But by then it was far too late to get his sandwiches back, and by the time they crossed the lake he'd already done a 'spit shake' and a received a Chinese burn from James, so he supposed that made them friends.

Despite his belief that first impressions were rarely right, Remus was sure with a fervent certainty that he wasn't going to like the island. There was the sun, for one thing. It was pretty enough, he supposed, when it was on the other side of a glass window and making the Hogwarts grounds less generally grey, but when it kept getting in your _eyes_, and reflecting off _rocks_, and making everything shine in blinding technicolour, it kind of gave you a headache. Also, inevitably, with the sun came _heat_. Not only was heat an utterly new concept for one who spent the greater part of their year in _Scotland_, it was also a big problem, especially when you were wearing a woollen jumper, a cheesecloth shirt _and_ a vest. Sirius, of course, was quite happy to prance about in the ferns completely topless, occasionally beating his chest like a gorilla. Remus was trying not to gawk, really he was, but it didn't help that Sirius was such a bloody exhibitionist. He probably thought Remus was envying the extreme firmness of his abdominals, or something Quidditchy like that. Actually, Remus wasn't entirely 100 on why he found the sight so disconcerting, but he thought it might something to do with the fact that Sirius's skin didn't look as if he lived underneath a wet rock and never ventured into daylight (as Remus's did). His friend's chest wasn't tan, not yet at least, but at least it wasn't the hue of an anaemic polar bear.

Also, even if the island was, as Remus was beginning to suspect, completely deserted, he wasn't about to pull off his woollen jumper and reveal his pale, pale chest to the world. James would point, and Sirius would laugh, and even Peter might snigger a bit, if he'd stopped raving about his new sworn enemies (the crabs). Yes, they'd matured a bit since 'spit shakes' and Dungbo- well, _those_ were still a constant source of amusement- but Remus's numerous physical inadequacies were still ridiculed at every available opportunity.

There was also no way in hell he was going to let anyone see his knees, not if he could help it. He'd managed to keep their astonishing knobbliness a secret for five whole years, and he was damned if he'd let a bit of sunshine nudge him into taking his trousers off.

Then there was the dilemma of the sand. Remus hadn't removed his shoes once, but he could feel dozens of little grains squidging between his toes whenever he took a step. He'd made Sirius stop several times while he hopped around and emptied the contents of his scuffed brown shoes onto the ground. It didn't matter how hard he scraped the inside of the sole, _every single bloody time_ he put them back on, it felt like he was traversing the Sahara. In slightly damp and very sweaty socks that kept bunching round his ankles.

Remus continued to plod along behind Sirius in his sticky, exhausted and sun-blinded state, not realising that Sirius had stopped walking until he bumped into him, tripped over his own feet (damn things were always getting in the way) and fell over. Spitting out a mouthful of sand, Remus looked around at their surroundings. They were back at the clearing next to the beach. Back where they had started.

"I don't think," Sirius said, extending a hand to Remus carelessly, "that there's anyone else here."

"Oh, right," Remus answered pulling himself up, and dusting off his trousers. His friend looked slightly sheepish and ashamed. "That's just great, you know, bloody amazing, fabulous really, because we're on a desert island without any wands, and we have no clue how we're going to get off, and this is almost definitely your fault-"

"Sssh!" Sirius hissed, grey eyes flashing urgently. Remus was incensed.

"Don't _shush_ me-"

"There's something moving behind _that bush_." Sirius pointed, trembling with quiet excitement. Remus suppressed the urge to run very fast in the opposite direction.

"Something _moving_? What do you, er, propose we do?" Remus asked almost silently, trying to sound casually interested and not at all like a 'sissy girl'.

"You go stand over that way, to cut it off if it tries to escape, and I'll creep round and jump on it and pin it to the ground."

"You'll… jump on it, whatever it is." Remus clarified, feeling ever so slightly insane. Sirius nodded, black hair falling over his eyes.

"And pin it to the ground."

"Yeah, I'll pin it to the ground."

"In the event that you _don't_ manage to pin it to the ground, it'll run at… me?"

"Yes, but then _you'll_ pin it to the ground." Sirius started to make his way towards the bush, treading softly through the undergrowth. He looked extremely stupid, in no shirt and jeans, trying to sneak up on the bush. "It's probably only a piglet or something."

"Come back! Pads! What if it's not a piglet?" Remus fidgeted with his sleeves, and looked at the dark green fronds of the shrub, which were quivering slightly, like a bewitched jelly. He didn't feel like mentioning the serious doubts he was having about his ability to pin things down. "What if it has _claws_?"

Sirius did not appear to have heard this shamefully un-Marauderlike statement, or if he did, he ignored it. He grinned manically at Remus, then mouthed, with all the restrained excitement of a psychopath, 'one… two… three…' before launching himself into the air and crashing into the bush with a mad yell. Whatever it was gave a bloodcurdling squeal, so high-pitched that Remus thought they'd ambushed a piglet after all. This happy thought was soon crushed, however, when Sirius rolled out from behind the bush, grappling with a very familiar, generously-nosed, greasy-haired _someone_.

"Aagh! Get the fuck off me, you wanker. Stop it! Ow! Look, that hurt, you buggering twatfaced-" Snape was busy trying to keep Sirius as far away as possible (or, failing that, at arm's length) and Sirius, although he obviously realised that Snape was not a curly-tailed farm animal and in fact, a human being (although this was debatable), seemed insistent on slapping Snape around the face and neck repeatedly. Remus watched the scene, biting his lower lip in anxiety as the two boys tussled in the sand. Snape's long tendrils of hair flapped wildly, and hit Sirius in the face, making Sirius growl with disgust and recommence slapping with renewed fervour. Between Snape's noisy, indignant yells and Sirius's taunts, Remus was not surprised when he heard running footsteps behind approaching them.

"Prongs, what on earth do you think we should do?" Remus pleaded, not turning around. The fight was a whirlwind of black hair and black robes and loud threats, and trying to separate the two entities when they were so obviously enthusiastic about hurting each other did not look like a particularly attractive prospect.

"Bloody hell," a voice replied coolly. It was soft and female, and almost certainly not James's, unless James had undergone extreme gender realignment in the half hour they'd left him alone with Peter. Remus turned to stare, and Lily Evans stared back calmly. Her strawberry-red hair was tied back in a ponytail, and she was wearing her gleaming prefect's badge over black robes. She looked as unruffled as one for whom inexplicably turning up on desert islands was a normal occurrence. Stepping forward, she peered at the two boys on the floor, her green eyes flashing. Sirius was banging Snape's head against a tree root. "What the hell are you two doing down there?"

"Nothing," Sirius replied, charming in an instant. He loosened his grip on the other boy's hair and wiped his hands on the front of his jeans, wincing when they came away oily.

"Maniac," Snape whimpered, wriggling out from underneath Sirius. His robes were covered in smudges of dirt and leaves, and his stringy hair was tangled and limp. Dishevelled was clearly Not A Good Look for him.

"Prongs will be just delighted to see you," Sirius assured Lily, scrambling to his feet and pumping her hand up and down good-naturedly. "As am I, of course. Naturally." Lily withdrew her hand, sighing.

"I should have guessed. I just _knew_ this had something to do with you two."

Remus sidled towards Snape awkwardly. Someone, he felt, had to apologise, for the jumping, and the pinning, and the repeated pummelling of the head and torso.

"Hope you're… er… not inconvenienced at all, by-"

"Bloody Merlin, shut up." Snape snarled.

James was acting as dignified as a boy wearing only boxer shorts and a blazer could ever possibly hope to act. Sirius thought it would quite probably be his only redeeming quality in this situation, considering the fact that Evans still a) wanted nothing to do with him, and b) obviously blamed him for everything that had taken place. At least James was managing to finish his sentences without projectile vomiting into Evans's lap. This would probably increase the odds of him pulling from one in a million to one in nine hundred and ninety-nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety-nine. Progress.

"Miss Evans," James said courteously, sliding obsequiously onto the log Evans was currently perched on, "I must say again, on behalf of all of us, how very glad we are to have you-"

"Shut up," Lily said tersely, from behind gritted teeth.

"Of course, whatever you want, right," James agreed, and then went back to staring at her with an expression that said quite clearly, 'I am your devoted slave, Evans, I will do your bidding and worship you daily, but you should know that right now I am imagining you in a coconut bra and a grass skirt. With a garland of flowers in your hair'.

"You know, I'm really hot," Lily commented, after a pause, trying distract herself from the intensity of James's loving gaze. At the moment he was staring at her and making occasional contented sounds deep in his throat. It sounded like an odd sort of purring. Sirius detested cats.

"We could fashion you some clothes out of natural fibres," James said eagerly, wiping some drool out of the corner of his mouth. "You know, more airy things. There's plenty of grass… coconuts…"

Sirius sometimes wished James wasn't so transparent.

Remus was sitting near a sleeping Peter in the shade. Snape was sulking a few feet away under a tree, and was refusing to speak to anyone. Peter was curled up in a peaceful ball, sucking on his thumb like an extremely large and pink baby. Remus smoking another of the cigarettes he'd had in his pocket. He was also still wearing his grey jumper, even though it had to be at least thirty… or forty… very hot, anyway. He was staring out at the beach thoughtfully, his hazel eyes scanning the ocean. He glanced at Sirius after a while, who realised he was staring and shook himself.

"How'd you light that?" Sirius asked gruffly, averting his eyes.

"Lighter," Remus answered wryly, blowing the smoke out in Snape's direction, who made a big show of coughing and fanning the air with his spindly fingers. Sirius scowled, and wished him a slow, torturous death caused by something much more dangerous than secondhand smoke – him.

"That's good," Lily said suddenly. "We can use that to make fires, keep us warm when it gets dark, that kind of thing. Make a signal."

"Shouldn't we sort out the sleeping arrangements first?" James contributed eagerly. He blushed, and fiddled with his glasses when Sirius shot him a Look. "I mean, make a shelter. So we have a base."

"That's not a bad idea, but I'd prefer to get off this island as soon as possible," Lily replied curtly. "We should make a fire with Remus's lighter, so that anyone looking for us can find us."

"What makes you think we'll be found?" Snape sneered nastily from underneath the tree, making them jump. "If you lot didn't bring us here – which I still don't believe, by the way – then who's going to be looking for us?"

"All of Hogwarts, you twat. Dumbledore. If we don't show up after a while, they'll know something's up." Sirius said this all in a tone which suggested that Snape was the most inferior life-form he'd ever had the unpleasantness of meeting. "And shut up, wankface."

"Look, stop that," Lily scolded irritably. "The last thing I need right now is you idiots messing around. Wait until you have a whole castle to disrupt, ok?"

"Let's just decide on what to do," Remus said democratically.

"I think we should sort out the beds," James said automatically. "I mean the shelter. It's going to get dark soon... we'll need to stay close. For protection."

"I think we should build a signal first," Lily pouted. She tossed her red hair over her shoulder imperiously, and James nearly swooned with delight. "We do want to be rescued, don't we?"

"I think we should all leave this bloody hole, right now," Snape muttered darkly. No-one paid him or his overlarge nose any attention.

* * *

**What should happen next? (Sadly, lots of shagging is not an option...) (Poll Closed)**

** They work out a way to get rescued. (Lily's idea)  
They coughset the scene for lots of J/L actioncough build a shelter. (James's idea)  
Escape attempt. (Snape's idea.)  
**


	3. In Which Lily Has Scary Dreams About Clo...

**Lord Of The Guys: The Third Installment**

"I think we should go with Pro… I mean _James's_ idea," Sirius volunteered loyally, after seeing James's horrified expression at the word '_Prongs_'. Clearly, nicknames that might make James seem anything other than the embodiment of maturity were Not On, not unless they were suitably squeamish terms of endearment exchanged between him and Evans. Remus glanced downwards at Peter, who was still curled up tightly, a little puddle of drool in the corner of his mouth.

"Wake up, Pete," he called loudly. Peter didn't move. Sirius threw a small rock at the sleeping boy. It bounced magnificently off his head, and landed near Snape, who gazed at it distastefully before grinding it into the sand with his heel. Peter sucked at his thumb in a peaceful slumber, oblivious to all the excitement. Sirius picked up a much bigger rock, grinning.

"Wake _up_, Peter!" Remus repeated, more loudly, and then, to Sirius, "Put. It. Down." Sirius stopped taking aim and replaced the rock grudgingly. Peter opened his bleary round eyes and glared in Remus's general direction.

"Hello," he mumbled resentfully, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. "Where are we going now?"

"We're voting," James informed him, who kept glancing at Lily out of the corner of his eyes. It seemed that he couldn't function properly without gazing at her in adoration, which was unfortunate, as she seemed more than eager to throw sand in his eyes if she caught him ogling again.

"Voting, like in an election?" Peter mumbled eventually, showing about as much interest in the proceedings as a particularly apathetic inkwell would. James nodded, and quickly finger-combed his hair to make his appearance more respectable. It was a bit pointless – politicians rarely obtained votes by wearing half the usual amount of clothing and dragging grubby fingers through locks that would make even the most hardened hairdresser in England quail and seek refuge behind her curling tongs and _Readers Digests_. Still, it was the thought that counted.

"I elect Prongs," Peter said instantly. Lily groaned.

"You don't even know what we're voting for, Pettigrew. What exactly do you expect Potter to _do_, if you do elect him?"

"Provide clean, comfortable, _communal_ bedding for everyone," James assured Peter, smiling his best vote-for-me smile. Sirius rolled his eyes. James was doing it all _wrong_; it was supposed to be more 'lopsided grin' than a full-wattage, 'I-want-to-eat-your-brain-is-that-quite-a lright-officer' beam. "And I promise a shelter, too. My long-term goals are-"  
"My long-term goal is that there _are_ no long-term goals," Lily interrupted. "This isn't some kind of holiday; we're not going spend all our time splashing around, sunbathing, wearing flowers in our hair and drinking out of coconuts…"

James's looked distraught as Lily crushed each if his feeble coconut-related plans on How to Score on the Island. Admittedly, he had been envisioned the 'splashing around' to be along the lines of skinny-dipping, and the sunbathing would ideally be topless - for both sexes, of course, James was all for equality. He made a quick mental note to mention that his campaign. Only… he doubted was particularly looking forward to seeing Snape's bare chest. Not that he expected to see it on display; Snape, being the Greasy And Evil one, would probably have some hideous deformity he'd want to hide, like a missing belly-button, or a third nipple.

"… because we want to go back to _Hogwarts_," Lily finished, wrinkling her freckled nose emphatically. "We don't want to set up a home or anything. You need a good _reason_ if you want to elect someone something… it means that they assume responsibility, that they-"

"I elect Prongs," Peter repeated, sounding highly confused. "Because… he said something about beds… and they'd be useful for… for..."

Lily stared.

"For _sleeping_ on," Peter finished, and stuck his chin out defiantly. Snape made an exasperated noise from underneath his tree.

"Are _you_ in favour of actually doing something about getting _out_ of here?" Lily enquired, turning on him. "Or are you simply going to vote for the shelter, because this is quite obviously a Boys' Club Island and I don't have the required amount of testosterone and body hair to influence anything?"

"Evans, I vote that we try and leave as soon as possible," Snape retorted hotly. "I don't trust this lot at all, I wouldn't blink around them, much less go to sleep… and Black's a raving maniac…"

"I am still here, you know," Sirius interrupted conversationally. "And so is my good friend, Mr Rock." He picked up the large stone sphere and pretended –only Remus wasn't all too certain that he was only pretending – to aim it at Snape's face. "Snape, that nose of yours presents a wonderfully tempting target."

"Eat shit, Black," Snape snarled, but flinched when Sirius faked lobbing the rock at him, but caught it in the palm of his hand.

"Ten minutes without your wands, and you start throwing rocks," Lily moaned in despair. "Why are boys so woefully _primitive_?"

"I'm not primitive," James objected, sounding deeply hurt. Lily looked him up and down appraisingly, her green eyes flashing.

"You," she said finally, "are not wearing a _shirt_."

"You noticed!" James exclaimed, ecstatic. If he had been a bird that could puff itself up with pride, he would at that moment have resembled an obese budgerigar. Snape stood up, and shuffled towards the log, making an unnecessarily large detour to avoid Sirius and Mr Rock.

"Can we get _on_?"

"Er, Pads, would you please put the bloody rock _down_?" Remus asked, in a voice as non-hysterical as he could muster. Lily was right, it looked as if Sirius had found a Muggle-caveman substitute for the Stunning spell. Sirius's thought pattern was quite easy to decipher; if Snape was knocked unconscious, he wouldn't be such a greasy wanker all the time. Well, he _would_ still be a greasy wanker, but at least he wouldn't be a whiny bitch to boot.

"No, I don't think I will," Sirius said, turning it over and over in his hands and shooting meaningful looks at Snape, who paled visibly underneath the slick layer of sweat on his skin, but ignored him.

"Remus, it's your turn," Lily pointed out. "Black and Pettigrew are supporting Potter, as per usual, and Snape agrees with me, so you have the casting vote. And I hope you use it wisely, because-"

"I hate to say it Lily, but we really should think about getting some rest," Remus cut in. Lily looked as if she'd thought he was the only reasonably sane one all along, and then found him trying on ladies' underwear with his imaginary friend Bob. "Even if we're going to be rescued, we don't know when it's going to be or how it's going to happen-"

"We could be here our whole lives," Snape muttered darkly.

"Don't worry, your whole life may not be as long as you think," Sirius smiled, petting Mr Rock, who appeared to glare at him in a stony sort of way. Remus put his head in his hands dramatically.

"We'd have to pro-create, to ensure the survival of the human race," James put in, ignoring the fact that everyone averted their eyes and cringed when he said this. There was simply no tactful way to play the Mate or Die card.

"We're not the only people left on earth," Lily scoffed. "And even if we were, Potter, I'd do everyone on this island before you. Even Snape." Snape made an offended noise deep in his throat and Lily bit her lip guiltily. "Not that Snape's any… you know… worse of a choice…"

"Calm _down_, everyone," Remus interrupted, flapping his hands in a teacherly sort of way. This was really unfair – Lily was a girl, _and_ a prefect, and yet _he_ was stuck playing the mother hen. It was most insulting, there was nothing at all maternal about him – unless you counted the biscuity smell, and the fact that he constantly had stuff on his person, like his 'purse' and bandages and, embarrassingly, a thimble. The thimble hadn't even been his, he'd found it in the common room and liked the look of it, he carried bandages because they were a useful thing to have when you got scraped to bits once every month, and well, it was a _wallet_, not a purse. And it wasn't _purple_, it was plum. A thoroughly masculine colour. "Let's just build the shelter, and in the morning we can try and leave. We'll probably be home by tomorrow evening – no-one's going to be here all their lives." He looked at them all pleadingly. Snape shrugged and kicked at the sand. Lily pouted and stood up whilst James beamed at her, and Peter yawned, showing off an impressive set of pearly-white molars. Sirius looked back at him and winked approvingly. Remus's stomach clenched for some reason – hunger, most probably, he hadn't eaten for _ages_ – and he shifted his gaze back to Peter.

"You OK with that, 'Tail?" Remus asked in concern. "We're going to build the shelter now. Then we can think about going home."

Peter looked at Remus, bemused. He didn't see why everyone was so bloody keen to leave the island. At least here there was no-one asking why your Charms homework had been handed in late, or laughing at you because you put your clothes on inside out – James did too, once, but everyone believed him when he said he'd done it on purpose – or grousing because they'd had the bad luck to be his partner in Potions, and he'd somehow diced something he shouldn't. The island was paradise, really. Here it was hot, and sunny, and one could sleep and swim and paddle – _Crabs_. The word popped into Peter's head suddenly. The word popped into Peter's head suddenly. This wasn't paradise, it was a tiny spit of land infested with buggering, exoskeletoned pests. Peter's face hardened as he remembered when one of them clamped its claws over his big toe.

"You look constipated," Snape told him, breaking Peter out of his reverie.

"I'll help then," Peter scowled. "As long as I get somewhere to sleep."

Building the shelter had not been easy. It had not been easy to build a sanctuary for six people with no wands, or string, or knives. Sirius dutifully 'sharpened' a rock for half an hour, but it had all the bluntness of a wooden spoon. It had not been easy to organise James, whose atrocious concentration could only be excused by that that he was 'in love', Peter, who tried to kill a wandering crab by dismantling part of the frame and throwing it at it whilst shrieking incomprehensibly, Snape, who did as little as possible and kept muttering swearwords under his breath, and Sirius, who really made an effort, but kept checking to see if his chest was getting bronzed. This usually drew Remus's attention to it as well, and then whatever train of thought he had been embarking on usually pulled out of the station and chugged far away.

However difficult actually _building_ the shelter was, it was nothing compared to actually getting everyone to agree where to sleep in it.

Peter wanted to sleep next to James. Sirius wanted to sleep next to James. James wanted to sleep with Lily. What Lily _really_ wanted was to smack James upside the head, but she said the only person she could tolerate going to bed next to was Remus. Remus didn't want to be one of the three corners in some twisted love triangle. Snape wanted to hex them all and go and sulk somewhere quiet, but luckily he didn't have a wand, and Sirius tripped him up when he was about to storm off.

"So really, I should sleep with Lily, Sirius by Peter, and Remus by Snape becausehe'stheonlyonewhocanstandhim," James suggested finally, shooting Remus an 'I'm-Going-To-Buy-You-A-Really-Big-Book-T o Make-Up-For-This' look.

"I'm not sleeping with you!" Lily exclaimed for the twentieth time. "I don't want to be having another one of my dreams about clowns and then suddenly find myself being _fondled_-"

"Why can't I sleep with Moony, then?" Sirius demanded. James shrugged, and Peter, after a pause, looked suitably offended. "I only don't want to sleep with Pete, because remember that last time when I woke up and he'd been sucking my elbow?"

"Oi!" Peter objected, flushing. He punched Sirius feebly, the humiliation turning his round face scarlet.

"I'm not sleeping with Black or Potter," Snape announced to the company loudly. "And I'd rather sleep in a dank hole by the rocks somewhere… than with the Mudblood."

"Who the hell do you think-?" James began to bellow, stopping when Lily put a hand on his arm. James flinched, stunned at the unexpected contact. Lily looked perfectly composed, but her cheeks were slightly redder than usual.

"Fuck you," she said, and walked off, her black robes sweeping elegantly over the sand. James stared at Snape with a disbelieving look on his face, and then ran after her, the lapels of his blazer flapping in the wind. Snape didn't apologise. He gazed out across the rapidly darkening sea, to where the sun was setting. Nobody spoke, and Peter fiddled unhappily. Eventually, Sirius grabbed Remus's wrist and wrenched him into the shelter.

The dying light shone through the thatch of leaves and twigs, dappling the hard ground with gold. Sirius squatted on one of the grass beds and looked at Remus, kneeling near the entrance. Remus held his breath and stared back. Suddenly Sirius grinned, a wide smile breaking out on his face, like the sun through the clouds on a stormy day. Remus laughed in relief.

"We're sharing a space, right?" Sirius beamed. "There's no way you'll catch me within ten feet of Snivellus. Or Pete, even."

Remus didn't bother to point out that for that to be a possibility, the shelter would have to be at least eleven feet wide. Which it most certainly was _not_. He nodded and peered back through the leaves. Snape was walking by the shore, letting the tide lap up at his feet, and Peter was watching sullenly, a few yards away, hands stuffed resolutely in pockets.

"What about Prongs and Lily?"

"Him and Evans might not even come back tonight," Sirius replied, his grey eyes gleaming. Remus sighed.

"You always have to think like that, don't you?"

"I didn't mean it that _way_," Sirius protested, scratching his bare forearm. "I just meant… she's upset. Understandably. I would be too, if a slimy git like Snivellus said that about me. Prongs wouldn't take advantage of her or anything."

"I should hope not," Remus muttered. Sirius laughed, and he looked up in surprise.

"You sound like a teacher, Moony. _I should hope not!_ Come closer, you're not going to sit by the door all night, are you? I mean, I can understand if you're trying to keep Snivellus out, but there are much, much, better ways…"

Remus shifted awkwardly and crawled a short way over to where Sirius was sitting. It was really quite cramped – they couldn't lean against the walls or else the whole thing would collapse – and they were a bit too close for comfort. A cool evening breeze rustled through the shelter, and Sirius shivered, his shoulders knocking against Remus.

"Where's your shirt?" Remus asked.

"I left it where you found me," Sirius retorted, rubbing himself vigorously to keep warm. "It had Prongs's puke all down the back, did you really expect me to keep it on? Contrary to popular belief, I have standards."

"You could wash it," Remus suggested, lying down in a crooked fashion and trying to see if it was a more comfortable position. It wasn't.

"No, I think burning's the more attractive option," Sirius answered, following suit. "With that lighter of yours… trust _you_ to have your fags on you when you get transported to a desert island. Cheating, really."

"Mmm," Remus hummed. He rolled over onto his side with some difficulty, and a blade of grass poked into his mouth.

"What are you going to do," Sirius asked, speaking with his eyes closed, "when time starts running out?"

"I've only got three more left," Remus answered, patting the pack in his trousers. "No point in rationing them."

"You daft bugger- I meant the… you know… moon."

"Oh fuck," Remus whispered, horrified. "Fuckohfuckohfuckohfuck." Sirius opened his eyes in alarm, and sat up as far as he could without putting his head through the roof.

"What? Moony-"

"I could kill everyone _here_," Remus wailed in a strangled whisper. "I can't believe I forgot – I'm so fucking stupid – what am I going to _do_?"

"Well, you'd only kill Snape, as three of us can change and Prongs wouldn't let you anywhere _near_ Evans," Sirius said matter-of-factly. "So it's actually not that bad – mate, stop hyperventilating."

"Snape _knows_ already," Remus choked out, digging his bitten fingernails into the earth, unable to understand why Sirius wasn't panicking. This was clearly a time to panic. "I can't believe it hasn't occurred to him yet – and if Lily finds out -"

"She won't," Sirius promised, clasping Remus's hands in his to stop him from tearing up the floor. "Look, you've got about two weeks to go before that happens. You said yourself we could be back by tomorrow evening."

"I – was – talking – utter – crap," Remus hissed. "I was trying to stop you battering Snape with _Mr Rock_."

"Look, don't worry," Sirius shushed. He put his arms around Remus, trying to stop him from shaking as much as anything else. "It'll be fine, we'll sort it, don't worry. Ssh, right? It'll be alright." Remus trembled for a while, then lay still, breathing heavily.

"Fine. If you say so."

"I _do_ say so."

There was a pause.

"Sirius?"

"Yeah?"

"You're kind of _crushing_… my ribs. Bear hugs really aren't all they're cracked up to be." Sirius loosened his hold reluctantly.

"You're keeping me warm, though." Remus rolled his eyes in amusement.

"I'll take off my jumper, you can wear it."

"It's more fun this way," Sirius replied playfully. "Crushing you." He let go awkwardly, and Remus tried, unsuccessfully, to struggle out of his jumper with about a square centimetre's space to move in. After the third go at trying to ram his head through the left arm hole, he admitted defeat.

"Er. It's not working, is it?"

"No," Sirius agreed, shaking his dark head. "Leave it, I'm not that cold. Let's just sleep."

Remus turned away, to face the wall, and Sirius did too, yawning. It took a few minutes' of companionable silence before he realised he was spooning him. Sirius shook his head in embarrassment, and tried to roll over discreetly, but Remus turned around and glared, his hazel eyes wide and complaining.

"Quit moving around."

"Your hair was in my mouth," Sirius protested feebly, and settled down, his back pressing stiffly against Remus's. The coarse wool tickled his spine, but he didn't want to scratch it and annoy Remus even more.

"G'night."

* * *

**Who should have the first kiss? (Poll Closed)**

James and Lily.  
Remus and Sirius.  
Peter and Snape.  
Other (please specify, you know the drill).  



	4. In Which They Kiss

**Lord Of The Guys: The Fourth Installment**

When Remus woke up, Sirius wasn't there.

It felt like he'd only just left, because Remus had only just noticed the sudden chill against his back. The other boy was supposed to be keeping him warm. Remus rubbed his goosepimply forearms through his shirt, yawning. There was no point in his trying to fall asleep without the heat and comfort of someone doing the same thing right next to him… although Peter's grubby foot _was_ mashed up against his face, so that probably counted for… something. In some parallel universe where the ripe aroma of Wormtail's feet _didn't_ make him gag. After extracting all the little piggies from his mouth, Remus sat up and surveyed his surroundings blearily.

Peter was dozing close by, snoring like an anteater with blocked nasal passages, and looking cheerfully oblivious to the fact that Snape's greasy head was resting on his chest, one of his arms draped over Peter's round stomach. Snape's face, when they had the misfortune to come across it on their jaunts around the castle, had always had a superior sneer permanently plastered on it, but one might have hoped that, when the boy was asleep, he let his guard down and _smiled_. A happy smile, not an 'eat-shit-you-are-lower-than-the-worms' smirk, but a genuine smile. Alas, this was not the case. Snape's sleeping expression was one of utter disgust, his upper lip curled in frozen contempt. Remus felt slightly irritated by this lack of niceness. Even whilst napping, Snape managed to find new ways to be offensive.

Lily lay pressed to the opposite wall, her uniform black cloak draped over her sleeping form. The strawberry red fronds of hair framed the curve of her cheek, but her face was turned away, tucked into herself and the ersatz bedclothes. She looked extremely vulnerable and fragile in the bluish-yellow morning light. Remus didn't want to put _Lily_, of all people, in any danger. Quite apart from devastating Prongs, he'd never forgive himself. The moon would continue to do its thing, but he'd find a way to get them home before it waxed completely.

James, like Sirius, was nowhere to be seen, and the two were presumably AWOL together somewhere on the island, discussing how best to grill Snape on an open fire. Remus breathed a sigh of relief. He'd half been expecting Lily's cloak to move suddenly and a Quidditch-tousled head to emerge from its folds, but despite his obvious stupidity and lack of tact, James was too much of a gentleman to do anything like _that_. Remus privately suspected that some time on the island might alter Lily's perception that James was an arrogant, vain show-off with more knowledge of hexes than sense (regardless of how accurate a portrait that was) to something slightly more pleasant.

Remus crawled gingerly over the slumbering bodies and climbed out of the entrance, rubbing his eyes and pulling blades of dried grass out of his hair. His stomach rumbled ominously, and his mind sprung to the Hogwarts breakfast. Scones, bacon, eggs, porridge. Snape was sure to whinge if he didn't get something to eat soon, and although James had tried eating grass as Prongs, it gave him terrible indigestion. Remus would have to sort that out sooner or later… not that he was being stuck with the 'mother hen' role or anything. Cluck, cluck.

In the early morning, the sun wasn't as glaring as it had been previously, and the heat wasn't nearly as oppressive. He could actually _look_ at the sea without being blinded by the reflection of the postcard-perfect sky in the water. The lack of sunlight hadn't dulled the island in any way; it simply gave everything a crisp, cool quality, as opposed to the mad technicolour of midday. Remus waggled his toes, and heard a miserable squelching noise. He'd slept in his shoes. Remus undid his trainers, yanked off his greying socks and padded to the shore eagerly, letting the miniscule waves wash over his feet.

"I thought you hated the water," Sirius commented dryly, from a few yards behind him. Remus turned around, feeling the spray of the ocean in his hair.

"I do," Remus answered matter-of-factly, wading out of the swash to join his friend. He cast a sardonic gaze over his shoulder at the navy-green depths. "But, unlike you, I normally wash myself at least twice a day. So I do actually have to tolerate water _once in a while_."

"_I_ shower, you knob," Sirius objected, poking Remus in the ribs. "I just don't take poncy baths." He fell into step alongside his friend, kicking at the sand, which clung to the damp ends of their trouser-legs determinedly. Remus didn't bother to point out that it felt gritty and disgusting.

"Where's Prongs?"

"Went for a walk."

"Why?"

"TO CLEAR HIS HEAD!" Sirius bellowed exuberantly. His voice rang out like a trumpet over the beach, and in the mesh of trees, indignant squawking could be heard from the parrots, who'd been having a nice lie-in. They launched themselves into the air, circling about like vultures on speed. Remus stared at Sirius, who grinned sheepishly, and ran a hand through his hair, which was starting to rival James's in the bird's nest stakes. "It was just– you know. Getting too quiet."

"Some people _like_ the quiet," Remus pointed out, as their path curved in a sandy circle. "_Some_ people don't feel the need to burst a few eardrums if the noise level falls below a certain number of decibels."

"Some people grow moustaches," Sirius shrugged.

"I'm sorry?"

"Some people grow moustaches, but I wouldn't want to. I'm just not like _some_ people." Sirius shrugged again, his bare shoulders hunching carelessly. They already looked browner, although that may have been dirt. "Apparently Prongs and Evans had a big Chat for hours last night."

"About?"

"Er. Snape, obviously. And other things, like… school. And stuff. Which just goes to show," Sirius glanced at a yellow-backed crab a few yards ahead of them that was scuttling purposefully in the direction of the shelter. If Peter woke up suddenly, _someone_ was sure to be on the receiving end of a nasty shock. "Prongs knows nothing but nothing about girls."

"How'd you come up with that?"

"Well. You don't talk about… _school_ with birds. Even _you_ know that, Moony."

"What _do_ you talk about?"

"Er. Romantic poetry. How beautiful they are. How nice the dress they're wearing looks on them. How you've never felt this way about any girl before. Your secret soft spot for small children and fluffy animals etc, etc, ad vomitum."

"Ad _nauseam_," Remus corrected, grinning. "To sickness."

"Whatever. With Prongs it usually ends in vomit," Sirius retorted, digging his toes into the sand. "Anyway, you don't talk about school and homework and _life_ with _girls_, honestly. You talk about stuff like that to your mates, who shut you up anyway if you get boring. I talk to _you_ about stuff like that _all the time_. Only you never shut me up, because I'm never boring, am I? Am I am I am I?"

"I try to shut you up all the time, only you never listen," Remus pointed out. "You know, at least that means he's improving his tactics. If he didn't try to kiss her or anything."

"Oh, but he _did_," Sirius exclaimed, looking gleeful.

"Christ," Remus swore, stopping in his tracks. "How did Lily react?"

"I asked him that," Sirius replied, his eyes gleaming joyfully. "And that was when he went all mumbly and went off to 'clear his head'. Possibly she may have slapped him."

"Christ," Remus repeated, full of horrified sympathy for James, daft bugger that he was. He'd just been rejected. _Again_.

"They're still on better terms than they've ever been, face-slapping or no. They came back _together_. And they certainly have one thing in common, their mutual loathing for Snivellus." Sirius cocked his head comically. "Hey, I share that too. Maybe we should have a threesome!"

"You are foul," Remus informed his friend, brushing his light-brown hair off his forehead. "Also, if you so much as casually remark in James's presence that you find Lily attractive in the slightest, he'll turn into Prongs and gore you with his antlers."

"Awfully primitive way of chasing off potential suitors," Sirius mused, not sounding too disappointed at the threesome idea being crushed.

"No less primitive than the way _Padfoot_ marks his territory," Remus commented. Sirius gave him a rough push, and then tried not to look concerned when Remus nearly fell over.

"It's going to happen between them anyway," Remus said, once he'd finished imitating a wobbly tightrope artist. He was trying to get himself used to the idea of an actual Lily-James relationship, one where the feeling was reciprocated and didn't merely consist of stolen hair scrunchies – 'This one's still got some of her hair on it, look!' and exasperated conversations where Lily sometimes had to threaten bodily harm to stop James 'subtly' bringing up the next Hogsmeade weekend. "Both of them, they've got really strong personalities. They're trapped on this island, with all this unresolved – I dunno - _tension_, and sooner or later, it's going to happen. It can't _not_.

Sirius, who had been listening to this short speech with uncharacteristic silence, turned and gave Remus an Odd Look. It was the kind of look people who had never even _heard_ of Shakespeare gave Remus when he corrected their grammar. It was the kind of look Remus received whenever he forgot to wipe off the foam moustache from his hot chocolate. Out of habit, Remus began to self-consciously lift his hand to wipe his upper lip, but Sirius caught his hand in midair, and leant forward - treading painfully on his toes, _ouch_ - and then placed his mouth over his.

It wasn't anything mind-blowing. It was the briefest of kisses, and gentle, like a dazed moth knocking absent-mindedly against the lamp that gave it the headache in the first place. It was incredibly quick, so that if you'd blinked in shock like Remus did, you'd have missed it completely. He only felt the warmth of Sirius's face being so close to him, only _millimetres_ away, and felt the soft swell of his friend's lips bumping awkwardly against his mouth. Remus stumbled backwards after just a second of the contact, because he had huge, horrible feet that were always getting in the way, and Sirius had stepped on them, and he'd lost his balance for about the fifth time that morning, and if he fell backwards into the sand then the practical joke would have worked better than anyone could have anticipated.

After Remus broke the kiss, Sirius just looked at him, his grey eyes bright and shining. The surf crashing on the beach was deafeningly loud. The clearness of the day, the _clarity_ of everything, was hurting Remus's eyes. Sirius was still holding Remus's hand; the pad of his thumb was pressing against his knuckles insistently. Remus waited patiently for the gale of laughter.

When it didn't come, Remus's hazel eyes widened, then narrowed in confusion. He snatched his hand free of Sirius's, which fell limply to its owner's side. Because Sirius was acting like a raving lunatic by _not laughing_, Remus laughed instead, to fill the gaping silence. It came out as a short, bewildered snigger, because he couldn't think of anything better to do with his mouth, which was tingling furiously. Remus's lips felt hot and swollen and all _wrong_. His heart wasn't so much racing as doing the 75m hurdles.

"Very funny," Remus laughed hopefully. Sirius stared at him. And then, all at once Remus's heart stopped doing the 75m hurdles, as abruptly as if it had rammed into a brick wall.

"Hey - Lupin? Black?"

"Lily," Remus breathed gratefully. "Lily!" Remus shouted her name back over the sand enthusiastically, waving both arms like a drowning man. He knew he was being a complete twat to ignore what had just happened, but the absurdity of the situation had put him completely out of his depth. Lily stumbled closer, evidently having decided that it was too hot for robes. She was wearing her pleated grey school skirt and white shirt. Lily looked so incongruously normal that Remus felt an overwhelming urge to hug her. As long as she didn't flip out like Sirius, mistake the hug for a wanton embrace and kiss him. Oh God. He tried not to hop impatiently from one foot to the other as Lily walked towards them. He tried not to look at Sirius, who didn't say anything at all.

Oh God.

"Are you two alright?" Lily asked, once she was near enough not to shout. "You haven't been fighting, or anything? Only you look a bit bizarre, Remus, and Black looks-"

"I'm fine," Sirius said coolly. Remus kept a fixed grin on his face. He didn't have a bloody _clue_ what Sirius looked like, because there was no way he was going to turn and make eye contact with him. Ever. He'd spend the rest of his life coyly averting his eyes. Oh God.

"Are you OK?" Lily asked Remus pointedly, rolling up her sleeves. 'I'm fine,' Remus wanted to say. 'By all rights I should be freezing my arse off in a castle in Scotland, but for some inexplicable reason I'm on a desert island with a crab-molester, and my best friend was sick on my other best friend's shirt, which is why he's not wearing a shirt, as I'm sure you've noticed, because how could you _not_ notice, and he's standing right beside me _not wearing a shirt_, and we were just talking about you actually, and then he kissed me and he didn't make it funny afterwards and I don't now know what to do and is this what a heart attack feels like, and I really need a fag rightaboutnow oh fuck.'

"Of course," Remus said, beaming and hoping his cheek-muscles wouldn't give out under the strain. "I'm fine."

* * *

**Did Lily see anything?**

** Yes! Everything! She was see-ing and saw-ing all over the place.  
No, she saw nothing. Stop bothering my client. Next Question.  
**

**This question does NOT smack of dead plot bunnies - what should happen next? I won't necessarily use these, but I might.**

**The James/Lily.**

** More!  
Less!  
Just throw UST at me, and I'm easy.  
Kill them off. Now.  
Kill them off, as well as Peter and Snape, so that the boysex can commence.**


	5. In Which Dumbledore Is Teh Evil

**Lord Of The Guys: The Fifth Installment**

Breakfast was every dietician's dream… fresh, healthy fruit. A good half-hour's foraging for food had yielded only a handful of papayas, four bruised oranges, and a clump of sinister-looking mushrooms that Peter found in a clearing. Snape had assured Peter that the 'shrooms were perfectly edible, but Remus, knowing all too well Snape's extensive knowledge of poisonous fungi, grabbed the herbs and lobbed them into the sea. They had fizzed unnervingly in the water for a few seconds, expelling a dark green liquid, and then were washed away with the tide. Peter had watched the spectacle with wide, horrified eyes, and Snape pouted sulkily and stalked off, probably to plan his next murder attempt.

The only coconut tree they'd managed to find was about twelve feet high, and James had almost broken his unwashed neck trying to climb it, having fallen spectacularly from his perch three-quarters of the way up the trunk. After landing heavily on the ground –well, _Sirius_ – below, and ensuring that neither of their bones were broken, he'd wanted to do it again immediately. This moved Lily enough to call him a 'bloody fool'. James had settled for throwing Remus's shoes at the coconuts, in an attempt to dislodge them, but all he managed to do was create a brief hail of oversized footwear.

There was a distinctly subdued air around the small cooking fire as they munched on their breakfast. Peter mournfully speared his papaya on the end of a sharp stick and tried to roast it, to see if it would taste any better. Unfortunately, the fruit slid off the wood and into the fire, and when Peter retrieved it, he burned the tips of his fingers badly. Stubbornly waving away all offers of help, he began to suck both his fingers and the ashy papaya, while everyone else waved away that the scent of scorched flesh smelt a lot better than what they were currently eating.

"Fuck!" Snape exclaimed, after biting hungrily into one of the oranges. "This thing isn't even bloody _ripe_ yet."

Remus peered at the yellow sphere, which Snape had let roll into his lap. Scarlet juice leaked from the tear.

"That's because it's a grapefruit," he told Snape officiously, who picked up the offending fruit and hurled it into the trees, then wiped off his robe. He was the only one still fully dressed in boots and school robes, despite the heat - his long hair was plastered to the back of his neck, and trickles of sweat could be seen running down his scalp.

"I hate grapefruits," Snape scoffed, wiping his brow. "They're nothing but antisocial oranges. Give me a string of sausages any day."

"Mmm," James murmured in agreement, munching at his slice of papaya with a concentrated savagery. "Or a meat pie – just out of the oven."

"Or a beef burger, with lashings of tomato ketchup," Sirius growled. Peter made an odd mewling noise, and sucked at his thumb with greater gusto.

"Bacon," Lily said reverently, her eyes closed, as if she were visualising the lavish feast before her. "Rashers of really, _really_ fatty bacon, all crispy and glistening…"

Remus shifted awkwardly in his seat. Just his luck to be trapped on an island of closet carnivores.

"You know what _I_ really want?" Remus asked tentatively. They all looked up, eyes hopeful, waiting for another detailed description of meat-craving. "Toast!" Remus said, after a dramatic pause. "Just regular, stodgy, old-fashioned t-"

"I wouldn't mind _fish_, even," Peter complained loudly. There was a loud rumble and everyone looked to the heavens fearfully, before a secondary gurgle confirmed that the noise was Peter's stomach.

"That's it, I'm going fishing," James said decisively. He stood up and removed his blazer in a heroic fashion. "Snape, Sirius, Pete, you come with me. We'll have grilled fish for lunch, ok?"

"Or crab," Peter suggested. "We could go down by the rock pools and skewer a couple of crabs."

"Aren't the crabs _tiny_?" Snape sneered, pushing himself up onto his feet. "What's the point wasting all that time and energy for one salty mouthful?"

"Er," Remus interrupted. "Why aren't Lily and I included on this fishing trip?"

"Well," James said, looking momentarily embarrassed, "it's - _unseemly_ for womenfolk to provide the food, and someone has to look after her while we're away, and since you _don't like getting wet_, Moony, it should be you." James beamed apologetically, but Remus's eyes were tracking Snape's face, which had turned a fetching shade of puce at the name 'Moony' and was now wearing a look of horrified realisation. Snape _knew_.

"I see," Lily laughed wryly. "So, having breasts automatically makes me a liability, does it?" James looked very much as if he would like to say that Lily's breasts automatically made her something very complimentary, actually, but thankfully, he didn't comment. Snape was still staring at Remus in abject horror, and noticing, Sirius gave him a surreptitious kick on the shin. Snape whirled around, shooting Sirius a look of loathing. Snape opened his mouth to speak, and Remus cringed.

"Shut _up_, you git, Evans _doesn't know_," Sirius muttered, under his breath, but not sufficiently under his breath that no-one heard. James looked at Remus in alarm, his face pale, and Peter's mouth dropped so far open that it was a wonder his chin didn't graze his knees.

"Know what?" Lily asked, oblivious to the tension.

"That Remus – _Remus_ is really the one we're leaving behind," Sirius answered, coming to the rescue. "He's got awful co-ordination and he trips over his own feet, 'cause they're so huge, and he's just be a nuisance." He grinned ingratiatingly. "You're just the babysitter, Evans."

Remus was inordinately grateful to Sirius for saving him, but felt a thrill of indignation at his supposed incompetence. He wasn't _utterly_ useless at – manly things. They should have left Peter behind, at that. Remus tried to mouth his thanks at Sirius from behind Lily's back, but for some reason, the boy wouldn't meet his eye.

"Oh, I'll baby-sit," Lily laughed, not noticing that anything was wrong, or the fact that Peter was tugging at James's arm, the penny having dropped. "Hurry up and catch some fish, _menfolk_."

"Will do," James replied amiably, and then half-dragged Snape and Peter up the slope towards the trees, for fear that one of them would say anything. Sirius lingered by the fire for a moment. It took Remus a couple of seconds to realise that he was looking at _him_, but when he raised his head in surprise, Sirius darted after the others, his bare back already brown. Remus watched him go, flushing. He guessed they weren't going to pretend the kiss had never happened, like he'd hoped.

"I do wish James would find a shirt," Lily mused, putting out the fire with the sleeve of James's blazer. "His chest is so _distracting_." Remus started, because he'd been thinking the exact same thing about… someone else.

"They're all going to get sunburnt," he said, awkwardly. "We're the only sensible ones. Well – us and Snape."

"Snape's hardly sensible, if he's going to insist on wearing his robes all the time," Lily scorned. "And I'm not taking my shirt off for a second, not with James around."

"He's not around now," Remus said, then cursed himself as Lily's jade green eyes widened. _Really didn't mean it like that._ "Er. I didn't mean-"

"It's okay," Lily grinned. She looked out onto the horizon. "Speaking of which, are you and _Black_… okay?"

"Okay?" Remus echoed, wishing his voice wasn't about two octaves too high. If James and his glasses had been in the vicinity, they would have cracked from the pitch. "Okay? We're more than okay. Well, we're just okay. Nothing more, nothing less. You know?"

"No Remus, I don't," Lily answered. Remus took a deep, calming breath. Oxygen was helpful at a time like this, especially when his lungs were constricting so much that he thought he was going to faint.

"We're okay. Are you – are you and James okay?" Lily sighed in reply.

"There _is_ no 'me and James'. We're just – _amazingly_ – friends. Acquaintances, really."  
"Same," Remus nodded. "Well, obviously not acquaintances, and not with James – not that I'm not with James – but Sirius and I are friends. Of course."

"You're not making sense, Remus," Lily whispered.

"I know," Remus agreed. He touched the spot where Sirius had kissed him unconsciously, then snatched his hand away, heart thudding. "Don't you think 'acquaintance' is a bit of an informal way to describe someone you've known for six years?"

"There aren't _words_ to describe Potter," Lily responded curtly, letting down her wavy red hair, so it fell just past her shoulders. "Woah – that feels good." A cool breeze was blowing across the island, offering some respite from the glare of the sun. Remus looked up into the vast blueness of the sky, where _something_ was soaring down to the island, flapping its wings steadily. Lily followed his gaze. "Hey – is that an _owl_?"

The menfolk's fishing trip was a huge success. Peter was at the head of the returning party, his round face pink and grinning. He wielded a stick that was sharpened at both ends – and impaled at one end was a tiny crab, too small to see from a distance. Peter carried the crab aloft, as proudly as if it were a woolly mammoth he'd managed to bring back to camp.

Snape was next. He'd finally removed his robe, but the reason why was evident – he was soaked. His white and transparent school shirt was plastered to his scrawny chest, and his the water in his boots slopped wetly onto the sand as he walked. His dark hair was slicked back behind his ears, and he was clutching his nose tightly. He didn't look at anyone, merely stomped over to a tree and sat down underneath it, nursing his face.

Sirius and James were last, both carrying a slimy grey fish in each hand. Sirius was smiling modestly, but James could hardly contain his excitement. He waved the fish madly at Lily as they walked towards the dying fire. It slipped out of his hands and fell wetly on his head. _Attractive_, Remus thought.

"Well done," Lily said approvingly to Sirius and James. "I didn't think you'd manage to get anything, to tell you the truth."

"One of them's Snape's," James admitted, puffing out his chest with pride, and laying the catch down on a rock. Remus squirmed and moved away. Dead fish were… not nice.

"Why's he sulking, then?" Remus asked. Sirius and James exchanged knowing glances.

"He got all snarky when he managed to nab one, so I pushed him – really _gently_ - and he slipped, fell in the water and banged his nose," Sirius said, grinning happily. "It's not broken or anything, and I told him it couldn't possibly swell any bigger, but – he took it badly." Snape looked up, and somehow divining that they were talking about him, made an extremely rude gesture with both hands.

"I caught two of them," James cut in. "See, Lils? I'm an excellent provider, as well as being stunningly handsome."

"I caught the biggest one, you twat," Sirius shushed, giving James a shove. "What matters now is that someone's got to clean them – and I think it should be Peter, as he didn't help at _all_."

"I did too!" Peter protested, face red with indignation. He waved the end of his stick with the crab under their noses. It measured about three centimetres across. "I got a crab! None of you losers caught a crab."

"He kept missing the fish, so he buggered off to the rock pools and caught a crab," Sirius informed them. "You were meant to get excited about it."

"Did you have fun by yourselves, you two?" James asked Remus kindly. Out of the blue, Sirius turned and shot Remus a Look. "We were gone an awfully long time."

"Oh, we meant to tell you earlier," Remus answered, his stomach clenching uncomfortably. Did Sirius _have_ to keep looking at him when he least expected it? "While you were fishing – we got mail. Dumbledore knows we're here."

_

DRACO DORMIENS NUNQUAM TITILLANDUS  
Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry

_

My dear children,

Needless to say, it did not escape my notice when six of my students unexpectedly went missing last night. Imagine my surprise when I employed the several means at my disposal to ascertain your whereabouts and discovered you to be, not gallivanting in Hogsmeade as I first suspected, Mr Black, but in the tropics!

Evidently this is a case of powerful magic gone awry – unless you wished to be stranded on a desert island, which would be no great hardship to endure, as I shall always remember with the greatest fondness my holiday seventeen years ago in Thailand – but I digress. Naturally, my main concern is to retrieve you all and bring you safe and sound back to Hogwarts, to resume your studies. Alas, Apparation to your location is out of the question, and organising a cross-continental Portkey shall be no mean feat. (I expect that explaining to the Minister exactly why I require such a method of transportation shall prove particularly amusing.)

Rest assured, as soon as I am able to convince the Ministry (and as soon as I have toiled through the necessary paperwork) you will be restored. Perhaps if you were to explain in your (immediate, I trust) reply how you arrived on the island, it would aid me in the process? I hope you will all behave with much more sense that you are given credit for, and will not squabble needlessly until you are back in school and your Heads can allocate punishment accordingly. As an old friend of mine is wont to say; Constant vigilance!

Yours sincerely,  
Albus Dumbledore

P.S. Personal secrets are a delicate thing, especially in these circumstances, and it is entirely up to the individual as to whether he or she divulges them. You have my word that I shall not leave you stranded for so long that problems_ may begin to arise, but in the meantime, none of you should breach a comrade's trust._

P.P.S. Enclosed is a package which I feel will prove useful for your remaining time on the island. Soap, toothpaste, toothbrushes (if necessary, someone should demonstrate to Mr Potter what these items are used for) and a sturdy pocket knife have been provided, as well as a few other… trifles.

P.P.P.S. I do hope you all return with magnificent tans.

* * *

Ok, so this poll will work a bit differently. I'll pick the **THREE** most popular items, but you can only vote for **TWO**. If you vote for more, I'll know. So, I pick **THREE**, you vote **TWICE**. Got that?

What else is in Dumbledore's package? Pick ONLY two.

Full English Breakfast.  
Condoms.  
Face-paint.  
A giant shell.  
Diaries.  
A towel.  
Tin of sherbert lemons.  
One of their wands.  
Homework.


	6. In Which There Is A BBQ, And A Side Orde...

**Lord Of The Guys: The Sixth Installment**

****

"Dumbledore is the world's biggest _cock_," Snape complained loudly. He did a rather good job of summing up what everyone else was feeling.

"Shut up," James mumbled. His face, usually a nice, healthy pink, was flushing darker and darker, going from rosy to scarlet to magenta with astonishing speed. "Shut up, shut up, and shut up."

Remus looked down at his sandy toes, which were scrunched up tightly in mortification, and sighed. Looking at his feet was really much safer than, say, looking up and actually meeting someone's eye. That would mean he'd have to leave the realm of Unblinking Denial and actually _acknowledge_ what had happened.

Remus wished briefly that he was an ostrich, and could bury his head in the sand, which would make avoiding any potential eye-contact a lot simpler. There was an odd snuffling noise to the right, and Remus glanced sideways at Peter, who was sitting on the ground. Since he possessed all the maturity of a particularly backward toddler, Peter found situations like these hilarious, rather than humiliating or horrifying. His attempts to hide his mirth were failing disastrously; it looked as if an invisible person was throttling him, shaking his head and shoulders in a fury.

"I mean," Snape sneered, picking up the small package with the tip of his thumb and forefinger, "what exactly are we supposed to do with _these_?" He dropped them back on top of the package, looking disgusted. Remus chanced a careful glance at Lily, who was very deliberately _not_ looking at James, who, in turn, was very deliberately _not_ looking at her _not_ looking at him. Peter rocked backwards and forwards in his silent, hysterical laughter. Remus thought he might actually be having some kind of island-induced fit.

"_Madame Pomfrey insisted that I include these,_" Snape read, in an irritated drawl. "_We all do have your best interests at heart._" He looked up at his audience scornfully. "For fuck's _sake_."

Peter, who had turned blue in the face from the Herculanean effort of not laughing, burst into peals of giggles. No-one spoke. Remus changed his mind abruptly. He wanted to bury _Peter's_ head in the sand.

"What's in the silver tin?" Remus asked eventually, and Snape shrugged in unconcern.

"Probably _more _contraceptives," he spat venomously. "The old tosser, writing us cheery notes in _purple ink_ and giving us condoms when what we really _need_ is-"

"Anti-grease shampoo?" Sirius suggested caustically. Perhaps because he had seen the inside of his office more times than any other student in the school, Sirius rather liked Dumbledore. The unnerving frequency with which the Headmaster doled out his detentions did not seem to deter this relationship. Snape glared in response.

"Just because Black's morally bankrupt and a complete _slag_ doesn't mean that Pomfrey has to mail us some-"

"Shut up," Lily muttered, echoing James. She knelt down and tried to prise open the lid of the container. When she succeeded, Remus stooped to pick up the scrap of parchment that fluttered onto the sand. "It's just little round yellow things."

"_In times of great stress_," Remus read aloud, "_I always find it incredibly soothing to suck on these. The citrus flavour calms one, I believe, and they are certainly cheaper than narcotics._"

"Sherbet Lemons," James said dismissively, with the blasé tone of one who has dedicated many an afternoon to sampling Honeydukes' new stock. "It's meant to be funny. It's just one of his little jokes."

"Who's laughing on _this_ side of the Atlantic?" Snape enquired. Everyone turned to look at Peter, who agitatedly stuffed his knuckles into his mouth, but continued to chortle. Remus threw a sherbet lemon at the gasping boy, who caught it gratefully, and began to suck it, pausing every so often to look at the condoms and splutter. James nudged Remus in the ribs.

"Hey, should you really give him that? What if he chokes?"

"Er," Remus mumbled back, searching for something to say kinder than 'That was the _plan_'. After a brief respite, Peter seemed to remember what he'd found funny in the first place, and began to bray like a constipated donkey. "I thought it might calm him down?"

"Snape's right, though," Lily cut in, running a disappointed hand through her matted red hair. "Dumbledore's package is absolutely useless – apart from the soap and stuff, there's nothing _remotely_-" She opened a third cardboard box. Several small pots, a yellowed sponge and two brushes tumbled out of it, all bearing the legend '**Ferdie Frankfurter's Fabulous Flavoured Face-Paints! Non-toxic. Do not give to children below the age of three, or anyone who doesn't know how to have FUN!**'.

"He's mad," Snape re-iterated. "Face-paint. Sweets. _Condoms_. It's ridiculous. We could be starving to death, we could be injured, Lupin could be ripping our throats out. We're all in fear of our-" Snape clapped an alarmed hand over his mouth just as the noise of Peter's chuckles trailed off into a stunned silence. Remus's heart first stopped beating, then performed a death-defying leap into his mouth. Peter swallowed his sherbet lemon whole, James looked aghast, and Sirius's expression was simply furious. Lily looked up in bewilderment, like the only person at the table who hasn't spotted the cockroach swimming in the fondue and is wondering why everyone has stopped eating.

"_You_," Sirius growled, his voice low. Lily's eyes darted from his angry face to Snape's defiant one in utter confusion. "You… you can't… you utter _twat_."

"Everyone calm down now," James said hopefully, putting a hand on Sirius's back. "Mate, _you_ just-"

"I'm the one you should be fucking _scared_ of," Sirius continued, taking a menacing step towards Snape, and shaking his head for emphasis. Remus, feeling desperate, moved to block his way, although a seven-foot bodybuilder would have had a hard time blocking Sirius in that state. Remus expected to be pushed past, or asked to move aside, but Sirius just looked hard at him, almost _in_ him, his slate-grey eyes wide and angry. Remus felt his stomach perform several exceedingly complex acrobatic moves, then, all at once, Sirius raised his head and spoke to Snape over Remus's shoulder.

"If there was one part of the letter you should have listened to, it was the one about _keeping fucking secrets_, and right away you go and-"

"It's all right, I know!" Lily interrupted, standing up. Her eyes were shining brightly, and she looked close to tears. The boys turned as one to gawp at her.

"Evans knows?" Snape asked incredulously.

"No, she doesn't!" James protested. "And if you hadn't broken the promise you made before fishing and _let it slip_…"

"Know what?" Sirius asked quietly.

"Look, I don't know why you're all acting so odd, but if this… this _thing_ is about those two-" she broke off and motioned vaguely at where Remus and Sirius were standing, "-then I know all about it. And I don't care, I'm not prejudiced about things like that at all."

James looked utterly taken aback. A reasonable 'I'm not prejudiced' was not the reaction one generally expected when it was revealed that someone a person been living in extremely close proximity to had lycanthropy. It wasn't really something one just _accepted_. Both he and Sirius had been equally shocked upon learning about Remus's other side, and although no-one ever mentioned it, Peter had been uneasy around Remus for weeks afterwards, secretly scared that he would maul him during Potions, or creep out of bed in the middle of the night to tear him to shreds. James stared quizzically at Lily, trying to fathom the reason behind her apparently all-embracing response to the news.

Remus said nothing, but for a wholly different reason. That morning, Lily had turned up on the beach _just after_ Sirius had kissed him. She'd seen them kissing. She'd _seen_ them. _She saw us_, Remus thought in frozen horror. _And now she thinks that we're – that_ I'm_… oh, God._

"What does Black have to do with anything?" Snape asked, looking impatient. "And who _wouldn't_ be bloody prejudiced if a guy you thought was normal turned out to be a monster?"

"I don't think it makes him a _monster_," Lily protested, looking slightly affronted. It was official now; Lily had got the wrong end up the stick, and the tree she was supposed to be barking up was at the opposite end of the orchard. She carried on blithely. "And I don't think it had to be kept such a huge secret. It's not that awful."

"Not that bad?" Snape shrieked in a high-pitched falsetto, dodging Sirius's enraged lunge at him. "Something like _that's_ not that bad?"

"It's because of small-minded people like you-"

"I'm a werewolf," Remus said, grabbing Lily's arm and whispering harshly in her ear. "All right? I'm a werewolf and that's the secret and we didn't tell you because it worked out so well the _first_ time someone, namely Snape, found out about it. That's all."

"That's all." Lily repeated faintly. Then she shook herself. "You're an actual _werewolf_? A Dark Creature? As in you forget who you are completely and change into a bloodthirsty animal once every month?"

"Er, yes."

Lily looked from Remus's imploring hazel eyes to Snape's glittering black ones, then to Sirius's stormy grey stare and James's concerned brown gaze. She looked down at Peter, who had a sherbet lemon in one hand and an open pot of paint in the other, and was giving both considering licks. Peter rattled the tin of sherbet lemons noisily, and offered it to her, shrugging.

"I think this counts as a time of great stress," Lily mumbled, taking a handful of the sweets and cramming them into her mouth.

Peter, despite consuming half the pot of kiwi-flavoured paint, did not 'crawl off and die' (as Snape instructed him to do when _he_ was offered a lick), but managed to calm Lily down quite efficiently by sitting her down in the shade and alternately plying her with sherbet lemons – 'I know they've gone melted and sticky in the heat, but they still taste all right' – and telling her comforting things like 'Remus wouldn't bite you if he _knew_ it was you, 'cause he likes you. He wouldn't bite people he _didn't_ like, even. He's really, really nice - only when he's the wolf he'd still bite you because then he wouldn't know it was you. But that's not going to happen, because it's _ages_ 'til full moon and he won't be the wolf for _ages_. Okay?'

Snape, magnanimously, had cleaned all the fish they'd caught with the single pocket knife that Dumbledore had provided. Remus had been rather wary of giving Snape anything _sharp_, especially as his unconditional hatred for them all seemed to have increased tenfold, but he'd refrained from stabbing and been, as James had been grudgingly moved to remark, 'actually rather good at it'. It came from all the chopping and peeling that NEWT level Potions entailed, Remus decided. You always had to slice or peel or simmer something; it wouldn't be surprising if all alchemists were culinary geniuses.

Immediately after the fish had been cleaned, Snape grabbed a bar of soap and announced to the empty air in front of him that he was 'off for a bath'. No-one objected to this, as having him around was never exactly pleasant, and it was even less so after him having spent a good portion the past hour with dead fish. James and Sirius had managed to start a fire with the help of Remus's lighter (which had been under the mistaken impression that it would be funny if it didn't ignite the first thirteen times they tried it), and had between them developed a system of roasting the fish on a makeshift spit, where they sat on either side of the blaze, twirling the sticks and trying not to scorch their forearms. Remus had gladly relinquished the lighter, having exactly _no_ cigarettes left in his trouser pocket. After the confrontation earlier, he'd decided that chain-smoking would be significantly more soothing than sticking to his ration, and promptly finished off the few he'd had in the pack.

Remus was also given the task of writing the letter to send back to Dumbledore. It took rather longer than it should have, due to the fact that he kept getting ash on the parchment and then panicking about it and ripping the parchment in an attempt to wipe it away with his sleeve. The huge owl that brought the letter was becoming increasingly irritated, not being accustomed to the searing heat, and had nipped savagely at his knuckles more than once, usually causing him to blot his words. Then there was the added hardship of not particularly _wanting_ to write to Dumbledore, due to his apparent nonchalance and amusement at their predicament. They were trapped on an island, with no clues as to how they arrived there, and he'd sent them face-paint. Flavoured face-paint.

_Dear Professor Dumbledore,_

Snape wants to kill everyone and Peter does weird things to crabs and James is being generally stupid because he wants to show off to Lily and Lily knows I'm a werewolf and Sirius isn't wearing a shirt and he kissed me and it would be really helpful if you could just bring us home right now. Could you? Because I think my neck is sunburnt. And we don't have any proper food or anything. Oh, and everyone knows I'm a WEREWOLF. And Lily thinks I'm a GAY WEREWOLF. Because Sirius KISSED ME.

Dear Professor Dumbledore,

Why on earth did you send us face-paint, sherbet lemons and condoms? I hope they weren't intended to be used in any weird combination, because –

Dear Professor Dumbledore,

Don't worry, this paper only smells smoky because James and Sirius are nearby and they're using my lighter to start a cooking fire. (I keep a lighter in case of emergencies.)

Dear Professor Dumbledore,

Your owl just took several chunks out of my hand. And leg. And I'm not sending this anyway. Oh bugger.

Dear Professor Dumbledore,

Thanks ever so much for your letter, and for enclosing a quill, so we could write back. All of us were all really worried about getting back home, as none of us really have any idea why we're here. It just seems to be a hazy blur in our memories. We discussed it earlier, but perhaps something's just made us forget?

The cleaning stuff was really handy; Snape's already gone off to bathe - and I hope the others go soon too, because apart from Lily, they all smell slightly disgusting. It must be a female thing. Peter likes the sweets - and maybe we'll eat the face-paints if we get hungry enough, as James and Sirius seem to think setting food on fire is part of the cooking process - but somehow I don't think we'll be using the other thing. Especially as Lily and James seem to have begun completely ignoring each other – and not just one-sided blanking, James is doing it too – ever since we unwrapped them. Thanks anyway.

I hope you manage to get us out of here as soon as possible, and that the Ministry agree to let you bring us back. We're all really grateful for everything you've done for us. 

_Yours sincerely,  
Remus J. Lupin _

__

P.S. Somehow it got out that I'm a werewolf. I think that Lily's taking it a bit better than Snape did, but I kind of ran away haven't spoken to her much since she found out.

P.P.S. Maybe in your subsequent letter, you could send something useful that would help us adapt to life here a bit better? Maybe some clothes? It's just that Peter's in his pyjamas, and two of us are in uniform, and James and Sirius are in various stages of undress, which is distracting possibly a health hazard.

P.P.P.S. I just burn, and so does Peter, but I expect that the others will get brown soon. Snape seems to be turning orange.

"Finished?"

Remus looked up from fastening his roll of parchment to the owl's leg. It was Sirius, his dark head blocking out the sunlight. Remus peered up at him, squinting a little.

"Er, yeah." Remus knotted the string a little too tightly. The owl gave an agitated hoot, flapping its wings, and took flight, trailing a length of string over the sand. "Did you want to read it?"

"Not really," Sirius answered carelessly, sitting down next to him. Remus tried to edge away imperceptibly, just so that Sirius wasn't _so_ disturbingly close, but Sirius shot a piercing look at him over his shoulder, and Remus froze. "You told Lily about it, then?"

"Um, yes. Er," Remus said, wishing he could still conduct a sentence in Sirius's prescence without interjecting random 'um's and 'er's all over the place. "She sort of thought Snape was acting funny because of the whole, er, kissing thing. I think, um, she might've seen that."

Sirius didn't say anything. He picked up a handful of sand and let the grains trickle gently through his palm.

"I don't think that she'll – er – tell anyone, though," Remus continued, fiddling anxiously with the cuffs of his shirt. "I don't think you need to worry-"

"I'm not worried," Sirius interrupted sharply, staring hard at the turquoise expanse of the sea.

"Oh," Remus said, startled. "Good?"

"You didn't _have_ to tell her about the werewolf thing though, mate," Sirius went on, in a surprisingly amiable tone. It sounded forced. "You could have just _let_ her say that she thought we were gay. And Snape would have shut up about you being a monster, and played along. He's not utterly thick, even if he is a slime-covered Flobberworm masquerading as a human being."

"I'm not sure what you're driving at-"

"What I'm driving at," Sirius burst out angrily, turning to face Remus, "is that when you were faced with the possibility of Lily discovering you're a werewolf, or the others finding out that we kissed, _once_, you decide that admitting to _lycanthropy_ is the lesser of two evils."

"No, but I-"

"I'm not angry," Sirius said, slipping back into his normal voice and turning back to the sea. "I just wanted to know what, you know, you felt. And I guess you felt it was disgusting and horrible and that's what I thought before too, so it's fine. Forget it."

"But it wasn't like that," Remus protested, utterly taken aback. "It's not that I felt-"

"It's _fiiiine_," Sirius sing-songed, smiling wryly and standing up. "We'll just go back to normal. We won't even talk about it anymore. Like it never even happened." He cupped his hands over his mouth and shouted over to Peter and Lily. "Are you two ready to eat yet?"  
"Sirius," Remus whispered. Sirius ignored him. "Don't you _want_ to talk about it?"

"YOU LOT!" James bellowed from the cooking fire on the beach. He was carrying the charred fish aloft on a large flat rock. "I. AM. THE. BARBEQUE... KING!" Peter and Lily looked up from the shade beside the shelter.

"The barbeque king's boxers are on fire," Lily called back, pointing at James's left leg, which was smouldering. Disbelieving, James rolled his eyes and glanced down at his leg just as the cotton ignited. His shrieks revebated around the island. Sirius raced down the beach heroically to bat out the flames, whilst James yelled at him and danced about madly. Remus watched, feeling useless.

"BUGGER bugger bugger, mate mind the FISH – no, you've got to put out the bit down there – OUCH! OUCH! PADFOOT!"

"Lupin?"

Remus looked up for the second time. It was Lily, brushing sand off her pleated skirt and looking extremely uncomfortable. And since when did she call him _Lupin_ in that clipped, formal I-don't-know-you way? In the background, James sprinted into the sea, swearing foully, as Sirius and Peter crashed through the waves behind him, splashing him with salt water. Remus felt oddly detached from it all. As if he was in his own little bubble and could just float away, over the sapphire-blue horizon and-

"_Lupin_?"

"Sorry, what?"

"I've been thinking," Lily began, looking slightly incredulous that he hadn't been paying attention. "This thing about you being a werewolf sounds like some half-baked practical joke of Potter's and I wouldn't believe it for a second if it weren't for the fact that even _you_ Neathanderals can see that a joke like that would be in very poor taste."

"Mmm," Remus said.

"And another thing-" Lily said, tucking her hair behind her ear officiously in a way that forcibly reminded Remus of when she was being a Prefect back at Hogwarts, "I saw you and Black this morning. I'm not judging you, and I don't know how long it's been going on for, but I'm not going to tell anyone that you're together, not if you don't want me to."

"We're not _together_, it's not-" Remus cut himself short, unable to explain. Lily glanced briefly over at Sirius, who, now satisfied his best friend wasn't going to burn to a crisp, was currently preoccupied with ducking James's head under the water.

"Whatever. I just think we should – act like it's normal. We won't talk about the werewolf thing, or the kiss, or anything. When we get back to Hogwarts, we'll just forget all about it, right?"

Remus felt a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach. He licked his dry lips nervously.

"So – it'll be like it never even happened?"

"Exactly, Lupin," Lily nodded, not meeting his eye. "I think that's best, don't you?"

Remus nodded dumbly, and Lily turned and ran gratefully back to join the others. Remus rubbed his forehead with the heel of his hand tiredly. Sure, Unblinking Denial might be a safer place to stay, if everyone simply buried their heads in the sand and refused to acknowledge anything, but he wasn't sure he wanted to remain there anymore, not if Lily called him _Lupin_ and Sirius still made him so _confused_.

Then again, Remus had visited The Cold Hard Truth Comes Out once before, and it hadn't exactly been a pleasant trip.

* * *

b>(Poll Closed, and deleted because it was buggering up everything. Sorry! And sorry everyone who read this installment with the crazy italics.) /b>


	7. In Which There Is Gratuitous Nudity

**Lord Of The Guys: The Seventh Installment**

Peter couldn't fall asleep. And, as a direct consequence of this fact, nobody else could fall asleep either.

First he was too 'uncomfy'. This meant everyone in the shelter had to lie in an irritated fug of silence while Peter edged sideways, rested his head on his elbows, rolled onto his back, kicked his legs uselessly, shifted his weight from one hip to the other and then eventually lay still. This period of immobility would usually last about nine seconds, after which Peter would mumble something along the lines of 'grarse spokin me inna back' into the blackness, and roll over again, dislodging clumps of yellowed grass, brittle twigs, and other people as he did so. This ritual repeated itself a grand total of fifty-seven times before he discovered a position he liked.

Then he was too 'bored'.

"I'm booored," Peter whined.

"Pity, that." Lily replied unsympathetically. "Goodnight, everyone."

"Goodnight," everyone else agreed gratefully. There was a blessed, soothing silence for a full minute, and then Peter's clear voice rang through the night like an extremely unwelcome doorbell.

"I'm _still_ bored."'

"Shall I tell you a story?" Sirius suggested, sounding exasperated. James groaned softly, and tried to snuggle further into his blazer.

"Go on then," Peter said.

"Once upon a time, there was a small village called Hamelin. It was a very pretty village, with loads of pubs covered in honeysuckle and stuff. Hamelin had loads and loads of rats, which kept moving around and squeaking rubbish at all hours, way into the night, so none of the townspeople ever got any rest. This made them really angry. So you know what they did?"

"What?"

"They called in a piper who brutally massacred every single rat in the village. Ground their bones to make his bread. Chopped off their tails – and other things - with a carving knife. And the rat never – sorry, _rats_ - never squeaked again. At least not at a pitch deeper than a falsetto." Sirius closed his eyes, although this was hardly necessary as the view was exactly the same; total darkness. Peter wriggled at his feet in disappointment.

"That story wasn't long enough. And it didn't make any-"

"Count sheep, you imbecile," Snape interrupted curtly. Both he and Remus were supposed to be sharing his robe and using it as a makeshift blanket. As soon as they lay down, Snape had promptly stolen the covers and cocooned himself in it, like a butterfly with a generous proscobis returning to its chrysalis.

"I don't like sheep," Peter admitted. "I'm always scared they're going to butt me with their horns."

"What about ewes?" Lily snapped, sounding as if she would very much like to inflict harm on something.

"What _about_ me?" Peter replied, puzzled. Snape muttered something that sounded suspiciously like 'Kill me now', and was subsequently prodded, hard, by Peter's left foot. "What? What did you say?"

"Nothing," Snape snarled. "I was talking in my sleep."

"But you're not asleep."

"No, and you're not either. That's the bloody problem," Snape retorted. There was a pause as Peter repeated Snape's answer to himself and tried to decipher it.

"You're weird."

Nearly two hours later, Peter tried to nudge James awake. James, being a naturally heavy sleeper, did not awake until Peter _hissed_. This involved using an extremely loud and unsubtle stage whisper on him, drawing out the s's so that it almost sounded as if he were speaking Parseltongue.

"_Jamesss! Pssst! Wake up!_"

"Wha'…" James said, lifting his head a fraction and trying to squint up at Peter without his glasses. "Fire? Where?"

"No… I need the loo."

"Well, go an'… an'… and use the latrine we dug, then," James yawned, lowering his head again. Peter tugged at the singed sleeve of his blazer.

"I don't want to go by myself," Peter muttered. "Will you take me?'

When Remus awoke the next day, tired and legarthic after the two hours' sleep they managed to wangle when Peter dozed off, he decided that something had to be done. His teeth and tongue both felt as if they had sprouted a thick coat of coarse fur, his gums felt rubbery and dry, and he rather felt his breath left something to be desired. Remus grabbed a toothbrush and one of the small, navy _sachets_ of paste that Dumbledore had sent, and went to scrub at his teeth at one of the rock pools. The salty brine mixed with the mint flavour of the toothpaste didn't exactly delight the tastebuds, but it was better than feeling like the fish he'd eaten the previous day had flopped up his oesophagus and disintegrated on his tongue. Then he splashed his forehead with cool seawater and self-consciously undid some buttons on shirt. He wasn't sure how many to undo; he didn't want to bake when it got hotter, but neither did he want to look Italian. He settled for three, and walked back, feeling decidedly less muggy.

On Remus's return, he experienced no raucous shouts of 'Ciao, bella', which calmed his nerves a bit. Lily, James, Sirius, Peter and Snape were sitting on the slope near the shelter, just where the beach met the trees. They were all staring out at the turquoise expanse of the ocean, elbows on knees. As there were few other means of amusement on the Island, 'staring at the sea' had become a popular pastime. It required minimal effort on the spectator's part, and it was always refreshingly novel and exciting. After all, no matter how much they might look it, no two waves were exactly the same. Or was that snowflakes? Remus turned obligingly to the tide and commenced gazing. The company all appeared to be wholly engrossed in the spectacle before them, judging from the glaze that had settled over their eyeballs; far be it from him to cause a distraction.

"Clearly there is no deodorant on this island, and I haven't had a shower in what feels like a lifetime," Lily sighed, standing up. The boys tore their eyes away from the rhythmic breaking of the waves to glance at her. "I think I'm going to have a wash. Where's the stuff, Pettigrew?"

Peter motioned towards the shelter with a careless nod of his head. Lily walked sedately over to the shelter, and emerged holding a bar of soap and a small face towel, too small to cover anything of much importance. Lily then made her way past the boys into the tangle of trees, humming a jingle softly under her breath. Several parrots chirped gaily overhead. Everyone turned to look at James. James looked over his shoulder, in the direction that Lily had left, and then grinned at the group sheepishly. There was an awkward silence.

"I fancy a walk," James commented, sounding about as casual as a man wearing a rented tuxedo to weed his garden. Snape snorted loudly.

"You fancy nothing of the sort," Sirius yawned. Snape snorted again, using his considerable nostrils to his best advantage.

"He fancies _Evans_," Peter pointed out gleefully, and chuckled. James's face turned a rather fetching shade of overripe tomato as he bit down hard on his lip. Snape snorted for a third time, then rose to his feet and stalked inside the shelter.

"You are not going to spy on Evans while she bathes," Remus instructed sternly, once Snape had gone. "That is morally and ethically _wrong_, and a serious betrayal of trust. I can't believe you're even contemplating-"

"I just fancy a walk," James mumbled, "that's all. I need to exercise, or else I'll get out of shape for Quidditch."

"What are you planning to exercise, mate, your legs or your wrist?" Sirius asked wryly. James grimaced and gave him the finger. "Look, I'm sure it's not that exciting a sight. Evans, soaking wet, all lathered up, dripping with moisture, longing for someone to soap her back… _ahem_." James, who had just thrown a handful of sand in Sirius's face, stood up, as his best friend spluttered and rubbed his eyes next to him.

"I'm just going for a walk. I'll be back before you know it. Five minutes. Ten, tops."

"Yeah, it doesn't take all that long," Sirius coughed resentfully, his grey eyes watering from the granules that had lodged themselves underneath his eyelids. "I've heard him before, you know. Prongs has no stamina." He tried to dodge a vicious kick that James aimed at him, but failed. "And he _doesn't even have the decency_ to close the drapes properly –"

"You know what?" Remus said desperately, standing up. "I fancy a walk too. I'll come with you, shall I? How about you, Wormtail?" Peter looked quizzical.

"Er-"

"We can all go," Sirius agreed, jumping up and clapping James on the back rather more violently than was strictly necessary. "I love walks. Walkies. Brilliant, hey?"

The walk was not turning out to be a success. James was sulking, which meant he walked much faster than anyone else (especially Peter, whose little legs pumped like pistons trying to keep up), and refused to have any civil conversation. Sirius, despite being warned not to, had rubbed at the sand beneath his eyes with his fists, which were now bloodshot and stinging like mad. Peter kept snapping leaves off branches, making inane remarks, and Remus kept thinking longingly of the missing nicotine in his bloodstream (and tar in his lungs). In addition to these hardships, they seemed to be well and truly lost. Remus had realised this quite some time ago, but had refrained from mentioning it in case they really _were_. After all, you were never _lost_ until you acknowledged the fact - until you realised it, you were merely travelling towards your destination. Still, when they forced their way through _yet another_ thicket – or it could be the same one, it was certainly green enough – and emerged in yet another small green clearing, Remus felt concerned enough to speak.

"Er, are we lost?"

"Prongs knows where we're going," Sirius said, eyes streaming. He looked as if he'd just fought and lost a particularly vicious battle with an onion. "Where are we going, Prongs?"

"For a walk," James muttered, swatting a flying ant off his thigh and stalking off through the ferns with astonishing speed.

"So we're lost, then?" Remus asked. He felt it important he clarify this, so he could time his panic attack accordingly.

"Indubitably," Peter answered, nodding. Remus gaped. Peter had the vocabularial retention of a five-year-old, that is to say, he repeated every unfamiliar word that he happened to overhear, without much thought as to whether it was suitable in the context, or whether it was too rude to be uttered in civilised company. It was very rarely that he actually made sense.

"Look, if we're lost, we out to stop and find out where we are," Sirius complained. Everyone listened to Sirius. Gradually, they drew to a halt.

"Moss," James grunted. "It grows on trees and rocks and things. On the north side." There was a brief diversion while everyone scanned the trees for signs of moss. There were none.

"We don't even know where north _takes_ us," Peter grumbled, in uncharacteristic disloyalty. Then again, anything other than unblinking acceptance of everything James said constituted disloyalty in Peter's books.

"Ah," James said, brightening, "that's where you're wrong. This is an island, therefore if we walk for long enough in any one direction we will eventually get to - where?"

"Australia?" Peter suggested hopefully.

"No, that's digging," James answered, shaking his head. "If we walk north long enough, we'll get to the sea, and we can follow the beach back to the shelter!"

"Why does it have to be north, then?" Remus asked. "Using that logic, we could walk in _any_ direction and find our way back. Why do we need to look for moss?" James frowned as his theory was ripped to pieces.

"The trouble with you, Moony," he said quietly, polishing his glasses on his chest, "is that you ask far too many questions."

They started walking in one direction, straight ahead. It wasn't long before they heard an earthy, gurgling sound, trickling far away in the distance.

"That sounds like running water," Remus mused.

"Yeah, it does," said Sirius thoughtfully, scratching his chin. Their eyes met suddenly, and they realised. "Prongs!"

"We can't turn around," announced James merrily, with a let's-make-the-best-of-it-lads tone to his voice. "We'll get lost. We've got to keep on until we reach the beach."

"But Lily's going to be there!" Remus protested. _Naked_, he added silently. He felt rather more horrified than aroused by the prospect.

"We can ask her for directions, if you'd like," James offered jovially. "Females aren't generally very good at that sort of thing, but I'm willing to try."

As the four neared the creek, the sound of rushing water grew louder and louder, and James's grin grew wider and wider, threatening to decapitate him completely. On a stony ridge beside them, clear water spilled over ledges in the rocks and down an incline to the lake. Tiny brown fishes with a russet sheen to their scales darted from behind rocks and glided down, aided by the current. The nearby ferns, fed by the water from the stream, had huge, vivid green leaves, and enormous pink and purple flowers dotted in the foliage. Insects kept up a steady background hum of rustling and chirrups, and several parakeets swooped around the canopy, their feathers shining like precious gems.

"You know," Sirius said after a moment's awed silence, "if the bathroom back at Hogwarts looked like _this_, I'd actually take McGonagall's hints and scrub behind my ears once in a while." The others nodded dumbly.

There was a loud splash from the banks of the lake. Remus peered down to the water's edge, saw a neat pile of robes and clothing and grabbed James's arm, lest he try and do something idiotic.

"Right," he said officiously, "here's what we're going to do. We're going to make our way down, quietly, through the ferns, going straight _past_ Lily, not looking at Lily, not re-enacting detailed tropical waterfall fantasies in our heads. We're going to go _past_ her, and get back to the camp, and then never breathe a word of this to anyone."

"How about," James suggested, "if we go past, and I just look, just _once_, for a split second, and _then_ we never breathe a word of it to anyone?"

"No, you pillock," Remus said, letting go of James's arm. "Now, start walking down. Eyes straight ahead."

James grumbled incessantly throughout the journey down the slope. 'How on earth am I supposed to find my footing if I keep my eyes straight ahead?' was heard several times throughout the descent, and he even pleaded 'Just one teensy _glance_, Moony, come on' which earned him a swift poke in the ribs. Soon the lake was virtually silent apart from the occasional splash and the humming of the crickets.

"I wonder what she's doing," James sighed, as he trudged down in front of Remus and Sirius. Sirius was holding a twig and occasionally prodding James with it in the small of his back.

"It's better if you don't think about it," Remus soothed absent-mindedly, just as Peter said,

"She's only sitting on a rock, soaping herself."

"Wormtail, stop looking!" Remus shrieked, aghast. "And Sirius, stop Prongs from-"

It was too late. James's head had whipped round to face the lake - it was a wonder he hadn't suffered a serious neck injury, such was the speed at which he turned – and was watching a pale, slender figure, which was kneeling on one of the slippery stones that rose like miniature islands out of the water. At least she was facing away from them, Remus thought, so her modesty wasn't completely destroyed. Rivulets of water were trickling down her back. Remus glanced at James, who seemed to have gone all misty-eyed. His glasses were already fogging up.

"She's so beautiful," he whispered staring. "Isn't she absolutely… perfect?"

"I guess," Remus shrugged, averting his eyes quickly. At least James wasn't leering crudely or referring to Lily as 'a bit of all right', as Hogwarts boys were wont to do when they encountered ladies wearing less than the usual amount of clothes. "Now come on, let's go before she _sees_ us."

"But she's so…" James breathed. "Just look at her, look at the curve of her shoulder, look."

"Her shoulder?" Peter repeated loudly. "What's so great about her shoulder?"

The lithe figure on the rock turned around completely, and stared at them, giving them a clear view of absolutely _everything_. They all froze, rooted to the spot in terror.

It wasn't right. It wasn't right at all. Something was missing. Lily's chest was considerably more streamlined than it had previously appeared, and the curve of her shoulder was not so much curvy, as _angular_. Not only was something missing, something with the potential to severely emotionally scar James for life had been added. That was the problem. The _huge_ problem. Severus Snape stood on the rock, stunned.

"That's not Lily," Peter pointed out, quick on the uptake.

"I think I need to sit down," Remus murmured. "Oh bugger, bugger, _fuck_."

"I thought the only grossly oversized appendage he had was his _nose_," Sirius commented under his breath. "I mean, you don't exactly expect Snivellus to be well endowed, do you?" He nudged James in the side. All the colour was slowly draining out of James's face, as if it were swirling down a plughole at his neck. He was deathly white. Blackboard chalk had the darker hue. "_Do_ you, mate?"

"I… said that… Snapewas_beautiful_," James whispered harshly, shaking like a leaf in a thunderstorm.

He began to scream, a lung-emptying, full-bodied scream, which shocked the roosting birds off their perches, silenced the incessant crickets, and echoed a signal of total trauma around the entire island, at the exact same moment as Snape began yelling abuse.

* * *

**So. Right. Yeah. You want...**

Fluff.  
Angst.  
Flangst.  
Porn Without Plot is soo not an option, so don't choose this, bucko.

**Who initiates Kiss #2?**

Remus, duh.  
Er... Sirius?  
I hate S/R and only James and Lily should get together.


	8. In Which The Demon Drink Makes An Appear...

**Lord of the Guys: The Eighth Installment**

****

James Potter and Sirius Black both possessed a certain, innate skill, in that wherever they were, and no matter how desperate the situation seemed, they were always able to procure alcohol.

James could remember with nostalgic fondness the first time he had been pissed. He was at the tender age of nine at the time, and it was one of those balmy, warm summer afternoons that 'Kiss the cook' aprons and barbeque grills were created for. Nine year-old James swung his bare legs over the edge of the porch, hungrily watching the hunks of meat rotate themselves slowly over the coals. Between bouts of frenetic, impatient kicking and blowing on a long blade of grass for amusement, James suddenly noticed that Uncle Richard had abandoned his third glass of Pimms on the veranda. James had been told firmly that he wasn't allowed any; he had to make do with orange squash until he was older. This might have worked, had James been of a patient disposition, but in his opinion, waiting to get 'older' meant waiting _forever_. A quick glance at the lawn confirmed that Mum was occupied elsewhere – Uncle Richard had complimented her on her blue sundress, and then Daddy had pretended to get cross and challenged him to a duel, and now all the grown-ups were laughing and shouting and loosening their collars and being quite immature, really.

James downed a gulp of the cool, forbidden liquid and grimaced. It had _looked_ all right, with little wodges of vaguely exotic fruit sticking out of it at random angles, but the aftertaste was all wrong, too bitter, unlike anything else he had tasted before. James knew how to rectify _that_ little dilemma. He promptly padded to the kitchen, made cool and airy by the open windows, and emptied half a bag of sugar into the glass. He then drank it all in one go, spooning the remainder out with his fingers, where the sugar hadn't quite dissolved. It tasted much better that way. A few minutes later, on a whim, he'd added sugar to the main pitcher of Pimms, too.

"Stop laughing," Mum said angrily. The 'duel' had resulted in Daddy tripping over the battered Quaffle 'someone' had left lying in the long grass. He'd sprained his wrist, but despite there being several Healers present, Daddy had decided the best cure for it would be a good long drink and a sulk. Thanks to James's intervention, the sulk was well underway, but the drink had to be postponed, due to the 300g or so of caster sugar that was currently soaking in it. Mum was really very cross. Her nice blue dress had grass stains on it and all the hair was coming messily out of her chignon. "James, stop laughing _at once_."

"I can't," James said beatifically. He wobbled over to the throng of disapproving adults and smiled up at them placidly. "It's wonderful." Uncle Richard bent down and placed his hands on each of James's shoulders seriously. It looked as if he was trying to dance with him. James began to sway in time to inaudible music.

"What are you doing, lad?" Uncle Richard asked, bemused. James side-stepped awkwardly in response, and giggled. "Look, your mother is very upset. It's not at all funny."

"It _is_," James stage-whispered, shooting darting glances at his mother. "It's funny because we're _dancing_, and because… because…"

"Because?" Uncle Richard inquired, eyebrows raised. They met in the middle of his forehead, James noted with some amusement, like two great, golden... wriggly, furry things.

"_Caterpillars_," James said triumphantly after a pause, and was sick in his lap.

The first time Sirius got drunk was a bit of an enigma. If half the rubbish he spouted in first year had been true, then the boy would have achieved full-blown alcoholism shortly after losing his first tooth, and his eleven year-old liver would have soon packed up under the strain and gone to a health spa to recuperate. As the years progressed, though, Sirius's booze-related exploits became more than pure fabrication. Certainly halfway through third-year he had staggered back to the dormitory, stinking of Firewhiskey mixed with bad eggs and retelling a garbled tale of heads staring at him, watching him all the time, and smashed inkwells and finely chopped hazelnuts. Horrified, the boys had put him to bed, still raving, and in the morning he claimed to have absolutely no recollection of any of the events. Nowadays Sirius still rather considered that to be the desired effect – who in their right mind _wanted_ to remember what god-awful things they'd done or said the night previously – and the others conceded that he had a point.

Still, it had to be said that James Potter and Sirius Black were a formidable force when it came to getting hold of the demon drink for parties, for picnics, for performances and Potions lessons… they were like the patron saints of winos – that is to say, the entire sixth year - like twin incarnations of Dionysus (togas, bunches of grapes and circlets of leaves optional). And a small, trifling thing like being stranded on a tiny spit of land with no liquor for miles around was unlikely to stop them.

"Just drink it," Sirius was saying loudly.

"Nu-uh," James shook his head, brushing his sticky fringe out of his eyes. The sun was one of its more sadistic moods today, and had decided that the optimum temperature would resemble that of a blacksmith's furnace. "You try it first."

"Don't be a twat, Jamie. Just drink it, it's completely safe. You _know_ it's safe."

"Why don't _you_ drink it then?"

"It was your idea; you have to be the guinea pig."

"I had a guinea pig once," James answered stubbornly. "It died."

"I thought you had a toad."

"That died too."

Remus, seeking refuge from the sun, joined Sirius and James, who were bickering in the shade of a palm tree. Dark, hairy nut-sized pellets littered the ground beneath the branches, staining the dry earth ochre red and varying shades of crimson. Sirius was thrusting a coconut shell full of a glittering liquid at James, who was displaying the sort of cowardice a Gryffindor should be ashamed of, leaping away from the hollowed-out fruit. The liquid slopped over the shell's brim and gleamed damply where it splashed on the ground.

"What's that?" Remus asked. Sirius and James exchanged glances, then James snatched the makeshift cup from Sirius and proffered it to his friend.

"Water," James lied, his voice syrupy. "Are you thirsty, Moony?"

"Hardly," Remus replied, although his tongue felt as if it had been drained of all moisture and then superglued to the roof of his mouth, making it sound more like 'Harley'. "What's really in the shell?"

"_Water_," James insisted, his voice now taking on the sticky-sweet consistency of toffee and sounding strangled by the calories it had just gained. Remus shot James a tart look in response and he blushed, unabashed.

"Oh, _I'll_ drink it," Sirius said in exasperation, prying the coconut husk from James's all-too-willing fingers and gulping down a mouthful of the mystery liquid, coughing slightly as he swallowed. The other two boys watched him closely as he set the shell down on the ground and wiped the excess droplets from his lips with the back of his hand. Sirius beamed. Not wanting to be outdone, James picked up the coconut and let the remnants of the fluid trickle down his throat. He licked his wet lips consideringly, grinning also.

"It's not bad, eh Padfoot?"

"Would anyone mind," Remus asked, with all the politeness of someone who is on the verge of giving up and leaving to gibber quietly in a corner if any more insanity ensues, "letting me in on what's going on here?"

"Wine," Sirius stated simply, and he and James traded gleeful looks. Remus felt a bit hurt and excluded. It was always like this when Sirius and James had private jokes that didn't include him; he felt like a gooseberry, an intruder. He tried again.

"So… that stuff isn't really water, is it?"

"From water into wine," James inserted cryptically, and the two boys fell over themselves laughing, knocking the coconut shell onto one side. Remus blinked graciously and waited until James hiccupped and pushed his glasses higher up on his nose.

"We discovered what this island's missing," James announced. "What the missing ingredient is, what'll turn us from miserable, marooned _moaners_ to passionate, party-loving…"

"Alliteration won't help you attain coherency, Potter," Snape said, sidling over and scowling vaguely at them all. James paled as the large-nosed one hove into sight, then immediately buried his head in his blazer and screwed his eyes shut, repeating 'Buggerbuggerbugger' as if it were a soothing mantra. Remus tried very hard not to look at Snape, or to look at the air around Snape. Prior to The Prank, eye-contact with the Slytherin boy had been uncomfortable at best – an unfortunate consequence of having your two best friends humiliate him every chance they could. Sirius's little 'joke' at full moon had rocketed it up to somewhere in the vicinity of _excruciatingly painful_, and now, after The Bathing Incident, eye-contact with Snape fell into the category of things one had to avoid at all costs, on a par with turning up to the yearly Sorting ceremony in the nude, or being slowly eaten alive by rabid cockroaches. Actually, if Remus thought about it (something he was trying as hard as humanly possible not to do), it wasn't all that surprising that Snape was… gifted in that region. He had all the symptoms… huge feet, lousy personality, and the ability to instantly spark a small flame of distrust in all other males he encountered.

"_Inebriation_ is the missing ingredient," Sirius continued smoothly, clearly choosing to ignore Snape's arrival and address Remus directly. Although they had not mentioned The Bathing Incident once since it happened, things were still distinctly cooler – if the temperature it was being compared with could be described as warm – between them all. Remus nodded mechanically and stared into Sirius's grey eyes so as to steer clear of looking at Snape's murderous expression. If looks could kill, Snape could have wiped out the entire student population of Hogwarts with a single glare. "…. Easy, you know… Prongs and I, we managed to collect loads…" Sirius carried on speaking until Remus concentrated enough for the words to begin making sense.

"Hold on," Remus croaked hoarsely. "You and Prongs think you've created some kind of alcoholic beverage… and you're actually going to _drink_ it?"

"We're _all_ going to drink it! It's called palm wine," Sirius clarified brightly, as James recited his calming chant of 'Buggerbuggerbugger' in the background. "We didn't create it… This tree we're under now is a palm-nut tree, and you make the wine by draining the sap stuff into a container… it's complicated. Anyway, it doesn't taste all that weird now it's done and Jamie here says he remembers reading about it in Herbology, about how in a pinch it can be used as a substitute for-"

"That," Snape interrupted sourly, "is the single most ridiculous thing I've ever heard. I do hope you both die of acute food poisoning."

"Tough luck, Snivellus," Sirius countered, grimacing at Snape, who gave him the finger in reply. "Practically everything growing on this tree is edible – you can eat the nuts too, I think, except they need to be roasted or boiled or simmered or something…"

Remus couldn't articulate the numerous objections he had to this 'drink' Sirius and James were formulating. Most importantly, as Snape had just pointed out, they could have tapped the trunk of the wrong tree, and were about to suffer painful and possibly lethal side-effects. Explaining two violent and gruesome deaths to Professor Dumbledore when he came to pick them up – and was he _ever_ going to reply to their letter? – was not high on Remus's list of favourite things to do.

"Fine," Remus said helplessly, shrugging his shoulders. "If neither of you have died or anything in an hour's time, we'll try it."

The palm wine was very well received. It did seem to detract from the awful taste of the fish they had for the day's main meal –only the truly incompetent, as Lily said, could manage to both burn _and_ undercook a meal. Lily had somehow managed to absolve herself of nearly all domestic duties. Political correctness dictated that as she was the only girl, none of the traditionally female roles could be assigned to her, in case she took offence. Snape was rather more willing to appear sexist than the others, but was shut up by James whenever he attempted to speak. They ended up smearing the fish with liberal amounts of the red face-paint (ketchup-flavoured), and consuming more paint than fish. After they'd eaten, everyone drank _more_ of the wine – it was something to do - and feeling quite heady from its effects, wandered down to the beach, as a group, to 'stare at the horizon together'.

Peter and Snape, as it turned out, were both philosophical drunks. Given the chance (and the right volume of Firewhiskey), Peter would begin to pontificate on all kinds of philosophical and ethical matters, soul-searching and preaching, throwing words and phrases like 'transubstantiation' and 'moral basis' into anecdotes about pies, homework, and in this case, crabs. Snape, on the other hand, utilised his arguments to express his unconditional and absolute hatred for all of creation and whatever mythical being(s) might have created it. They both talked at each other, gesticulating wildly; Peter was red in the face and blustering on about a razor and infinite possibilities, and Snape was contorting his face increasingly vehement positions as he simultaneously argued back and tried not to listen.

James and Lily were moving closer and closer together. Every time you glanced away from them and then looked back, James had inched his way a fraction closer to where Lily was sitting, or Lily had leaned over again and was chuckling openly into his face, red hair akimbo, or James had stretched a hand out to casually brush Lily on the shoulder and close the ever-decreasing gap between the two. It wasn't immediately clear what they were talking about – their conversation seemed to consist mainly of humorous asides from James and Lily's tinkling laugh, punctuated by brief intervals of deliciously awkward pauses and deliberate touching and not-touching. They were encased in their own private bubble of flirtation. Every so often James would muster the courage to say something in Lily's ear, the threads of her strawberry-scented hair tickling his lips as he whispered. Lily's green eyes would gleam dangerously, and she would hit him playfully, or fiddle with the lapel of his blazer, and they would both laugh.

Not only was Remus sitting unnervingly close to Sirius on the sand, but his head was resting on his best friend's shoulder. The palm wine had put Remus in a shockingly good mood: now he was actually beginning to feel quite optimistic about being stranded – he was even considering _paddling_ later on. Despite Remus's unconditional hatred for quantities of water that exceeded the size of his evening bath, it seemed quite an attractive prospect. He'd have to roll up the legs of his trousers so they wouldn't get all damp – Remus hated soggy clothing flapping at his heels – or maybe he could just paddle in his boxer shorts, a la James. Remus stifled a giggle of mirth at the thought, but Sirius didn't drunkenly turn and ask what he was snickering at. Sirius was being uncharacteristically maudlin, actually. Perhaps he was put out because Remus had put his head on his shoulder. Remus had noticed, even through the pleasantly muggy haze, that Sirius tensed and jerked his head in the opposite direction when he did that.

Remus hadn't _meant_ anything by it, it was just that he was getting so _tired_ all of a sudden, and he'd been looking at Sirius anyway – better than listening to Snape's increasingly cynical opinions on life, and Peter's increasingly purple-prosed rebuttals, or watching James and Lily's sickly play-fighting – and his shoulder was just _there_. And Remus's _head_ was there, and _they_ were there, and everything was just _there_, and it simply seemed natural to rest his head in the warm spot between Sirius's collarbone and his chin.

"Sirius?" Remus asked, but the word was swallowed up by his yawn, and there was no reply. Perhaps Sirius was sad about something. Remus moved his head reassuringly against Sirius, and suddenly felt all the tendons in Sirius's neck tauten. They had been inhaling and exhaling in the same comforting rhythm up until then, but Sirius's breath seemed to catch in his throat.

"Moony," Sirius said hoarsely. He sounded as if something was squeezing his ribcage tightly, as if he was only being permitted to use a small amount of oxygen at a time. "Moony, you are _nuzzling_ me."

"M'not!" Remus replied indignantly, burying his face in Sirius's neck, which was tanned and smooth, not sunburnt, like his own.

"You are _such_ a fucking lightweight," Sirius gritted out from behind his teeth. "Don't do that, Moony. You're pissed. Come on – stop."

"Not… doing… anything." Remus murmured indistinctly, blowing a wisp of Sirius's dark hair from his mouth with difficulty. Snape and Peter were debating the meaning of life in slurred tones. Next to them it looked as if Lily was practically sitting in James's lap, and they were both in hysterics.

"Remus, please," Sirius said suddenly, biting his lip and turning to face his friend. Remus gazed at Sirius's mouth. The skin was slightly chapped and rough, and his lower lip was quivering. Remus reached up with his forefinger and gently prodded the bow of Sirius's lips and laughed.

"Stop laughing," Sirius whispered.

"I can't," Remus answered, giggling.

"Remus, stop laughing _at once_," Sirius hissed.

"I tell you I bloody can't," Remus replied, and kissed him. Softly. And it was short and sweet and it wasn't at all bloody confusing because it felt _right_, and it was exactly how it was supposed to be, and Remus was _there_ and Sirius was _there_ and he couldn't even tell exactly where Sirius ended and he began.

By the time they pulled apart, Remus had managed to stop laughing.

It took a while for them to register the fact that James had also stopped laughing.

* * *

**James's reaction. He is to be...**

Ever so slightly homophobic.  
Hurt and angry that he didn't know about it.  
Hugely over-supportive and over-compensating to hide the fact that he feels weird about the whole thing.  
Jealous. Not in that way.  
Jealous. In that way. 

**Gratuitous ticky-box question - which word(s) should I slip into the next installment?**

Ineffable.  
Tortoise.  
Mascara.  
Ticky-box.  
Xylophone.  



	9. In Which There Is The Inevitable Hangove...

**Lord of the Guys: The Ninth Installment**

"It's all right, Prongs," Sirius said hastily, as James scrambled to his feet, kicking up flurries of sand. Lily was upturned next to his ankles, looking distinctly disgruntled, but Snape and Peter didn't pause in their political bickering long enough to take in the scene. Sirius rubbed the back of his neck uncomfortably. "Don't – just – you know. Prongs. It's _all right_."

James's expression was inscrutable behind his glasses, and he was biting down on his lower lip so hard that the skin there had turned chalk white. Remus stared at the whiteness placidly. The palm wine had made his brain muggy; it was hard to figure out why everyone was acting so agitated…

"Are you… are you two _together_?" James choked out eventually. He looked rather as if he was dreading the response.

"No," Sirius hastened, at the same time as Remus said 'Yes'. They looked at each other in mutual consternation, and then turned back to James, who put up a hand instinctively and embedded it in his hair for comfort and reassurance.

"Yes," Sirius said this time, as Remus simultaneously said 'No', nodding in agreement. They looked at each other again. James looked as if he was trying to tie his hair into knots with his free hand, while his other clutched at the hem of his blazer as if it were a sturdy rope hanging off the edge of a cliff. It was the only shred of normality James had left to cling to; it belonged to a civilized world of grey rain and muddy boots and the ineffable joy of watching a slab of yellow marge melt into hot toast.

"Yo," Remus supplied helpfully.

"It's all right, Remus is drunk," Sirius explained.

"Moony is pissed," James echoed, still massaging his skull with his right hand and creating a lifelong crease in his blazer with his left. His mouth quirked hopefully. "Is that why – is that why you're – why you were – is it?"

"No," Sirius and Remus chorused together.

"I'm not drunk, anyway," Sirius said quietly.

"Ah," James said in grateful comprehension, beginning to pace back and forth in a small, cramped oblong. "I'm not either. At least not nearly drunk enough to deal with this."

"It's all right, mate," Sirius ventured.

"I would've told you before," Lily interrupted in a hurry, startling James so much that he quickly withdrew his fingers from what now resembled the nest of a schizophrenic hawk, and nearly scalped himself in the process. "Only I didn't know if you already knew and you were prancing about half-naked half the time and it wasn't the sort of thing one _brings up_…"

"What?" James asked, stopping in his tracks and staring at her with wild eyes. "Is Evans drunk as well?"

"Not quite," Lily replied curtly, at the same time as Sirius said 'Yes'. Lily glared at him, making a face. It didn't look as if it went the way she planned it to – she looked more like a sufferer of acute stomach-ache than a disapproving Prefect.

"You knew?" James hyperventilated in her general direction. Lily looked rather taken aback. "You knew that my two _best friends_ were – are –" James broke off, unable to articulate his bewilderment. Peter was engaged in an impromptu arm-wrestling match with Snape that had originated over a conspiracy theory. He lost the contest spectacularly and looked up at the others, ears pricking up at the words 'best friends'. "You knew that they – and I didn't – and you _knew_?"

"I saw them a couple of days ago," Lily murmured apologetically. "Sorry."

"How long? How long for?" James spluttered.

"We haven't been – we're just, _you know_, mate," Sirius said, pushing some long hair out of his eyes earnestly. Snape and Peter were watching open-mouthed now, all tussles forgotten. "We're just messing about. It's all right, honestly."

"Messing about is when you're both stoned up to the eyeballs, or drunk the night after a Quidditch match, or…" James looked around helplessly for someone sane or sober, without success. "It's not… this. It's not… I always thought you were kosher. Mainly. How can you – bugger."

James went silent and looked at his feet for a moment to compose himself, tangling his fingers tightly in the hair at the back of his neck. Lily uncertainly fingered with the cuffs of her blouse. Remus felt a new sensation swelling in the pit of his stomach to replace the euphoria that had been there only moments before; unease. James looked up, his face unreadable once again.

"Do you think I could leave for just few minutes?" James asked the air in front of him in a tight voice. Sirius frowned slightly.

"It's all right Prongs," Sirius enthused. "Seriously, I know you must be feeling-"

"It's fine," James replied stiffly, looking as if he knew nothing of the kind. "I just want a little time to myself, okay?"

"Sure… I guess," Sirius conceded, looking hurt. "But when you come back, we'll talk, right?" James nodded dumbly and walked away, his eyes fixed firmly on the ground in front of him as if he were scared that it might disappear from beneath his feet. Lily gazed at his retreating back, and then turned to look past Sirius, at Remus. She didn't look sympathetic.

"I hope you don't have any more secrets up your sleeve, Lupin," Lily said in a clipped voice, unsmiling. "I wonder who you'll end up hurting next time." Remus watched her in detached confusion as she ran up the sandy incline to the shelter and disappeared behind the curtain of leaves. Sirius put his head in his hands.

"Fuck, Remus," Sirius groaned. "What did we just do?"

'_I don't know, but I want to keep doing it,_' Remus wanted to say. Out loud he muttered, "I don't know."

"Prongs is freaked out, I know he is," Sirius mused. "I don't know why he's taking it so badly… I didn't expect…"

"Did you notice how she called me Lupin?" Remus asked, keeping his voice low, not for confidentiality, but because he was afraid it might tremble. Lily was acting like she _hated _him. So was James, in fact. He hadn't addressed Remus at all the whole time; he'd just been talking to Sirius. Who was still talking about something, his mouth was changing shape and his lips were pressing together at intervals, which meant he was still talking…

"…Prongs'll get over it. He has to get over it, he's just being – I don't know what. But still, he has to understand that this thing with you and me isn't – he isn't being – do you think he's is angry? I mean -"

"Did you notice how she called me Lupin?" Remus repeated, a little more loudly.

"What?" Sirius said, startled. He looked at Remus's miserable half-scowl and touched the side of his cheek gently. It was the kind of fleeting contact that hadn't exactly been commonplace before, but which there had been a distinct lack of ever since the first, fumbled kiss on the beach. Remus felt Sirius's slightly rush thumb brush his cheekbone, felt the immediacy of warmth, skin and pulse near him for a second and was instantly comforted and relieved. "Remus, she was just upset."

"Would either of you care to tell me _what_ just happened?" Snape drawled suddenly from where he and Peter were lounging in the sand. Sirius winced at the voice, and ignored him. Snape's tone grew mocking. "Evans didn't find out you two were shirtlifters, did she?"

"What are the odds of you shutting your fat face so I _don't _have to grind it into the sand?" Sirius retorted, standing up and advancing towards Snape gradually, with all the speed of a particularly menacing tortoise. This approach was extremely intimidating, and usually scared the victim shitless. Snape, however, seemed to be rather bulled up on bravado when drunk, and rose to be on eye-level with Sirius, then didn't budge.

"Highly improbable," Snape sneered, unblinking. "I always suspected, though. Unsurprising, really."

"Oh really?" Sirius asked in a dangerously composed voice.

"Yeah," smirked Snape, brushing down his robes with nonchalance. "Given the way you over-assert your masculinity, you tosser, it's no wonder that you've got disgusting habits. And as for Lupin!"

"What about me?" Remus interjected.

"Yeah, what about him?" Sirius growled. Snape grinned maliciously and pretended to be holding a phantom quill in the air, checking invisible ticky-boxes on a parchment in front of him.

"He fits all the criteria. Slightly effeminate – check. Never _really_ had a proper girlfriend – check, Spends a bit too long ogling you when he thinks you're not looking – check. Obsession with chocolate – every homosexual I have ever known has been completely obsessed with food – check…"

"You must have a death wish," Sirius muttered, "but as much as I would hate to spare your family the cost of a burial, I'm going to disembowel you so brutally that they won't be able to find _any_ of your remains…"

"And of course," finished Snape, smiling a horrible malevolent smile and delivering this last blow with a small, careless shrug of the shoulders, "he doesn't have much choice, does he? I mean – it's not as if he can ever start a family, being what he is – what girl's going to want to get into bed with, much less marry, a savage beast like him?"

Any sympathy Remus might have held for Snape vanished abruptly into thin air. Any commiseration the boy might have felt at Snape being the obvious outcast of the group, the lonely Slytherin in a pride of Lions, the one everyone teased and no-one really liked, the one who they were only civil to because of two of the party's Prefect sensibilities, disappeared in tidal wave of overwhelming emotion. Remus didn't feel angry as such, it was as if an icy hand had gripped him and was freezing him from the inside out. He dimly registered that Sirius was now as tightly coiled as a spring with rage, every muscle taut with fury, and if anyone so much as contemplated breathing in the next five seconds the spring would be tripped and all hell would break loose.

"Hey," Peter mumbled in bemused surprise, "don't talk about Moony like that." Snape looked to his right, where Peter was rolling down his pyjama sleeves and looking put out.

"I beg your pardon, Pettigrew?"

"I said," Peter repeated, gaining confidence with each syllable, "don't talk about Moony like that. It's not his fault, and I bet more girls would want to marry him and his chocolate than you and your… and your…" he faltered. Snape raised an eyebrow. "And your _nose_," Peter concluded triumphantly. "And your horrible superior…. robes and the way you're mean to everyone and your greasy _hair_. So leave my friend alone, OK?"

Snape looked at Peter appraisingly, stared into the fair boy's watery blue eyes, which were glimmering with open defiance, then looked at Sirius's naked anger and the huddled form that was Remus on the sand. Snape, very wisely, decided not to bother.

"Oh, I do wish Dumbledore'd hurry up with the paperwork and start organizing getting us _home_," Snape snarled, suddenly as irritable as a bear with a splinter in its paw. "Then I'd be rid of you lot," he muttered in an undertone, flouncing off, his robes billowing around his ankles. Sirius started after him, but Remus called his name.

"He's not worth it," Remus shrugged, although the sour aftertaste of what Snape had said was hard still to swallow. It seemed to have manifested as a lump in his throat, one that he couldn't quite force down. Remus shook his head and turned to grin weakly at Peter. "Thanks, Pete."

"Yeah, props to you, Wormtail," Sirius approved, rubbing his bare chest. "Slimy old Snivellus had it coming. That's why you're a Gryffindor, mate, you need to do stuff like that more often,"

"It was nothing," Peter beamed, turning rose pink with pride.

"No, it was something," Sirius said, clapping Peter on the back. "You're not a pushover when it comes to sticking up for your friends, and that counts for something."

"Well, I had to do something about Slimy Snivellus," Peter agreed, pleasantly surprised by all the attention. "How dare he say you were gay, anyway?"

"I…" Remus opened his mouth to say something to Peter, but the syllable just drifted out of his mouth and made its solitary way down the beach. There wasn't really anything _to_ say. Remus gazed numbly at the turquoise ocean, suddenly disregarding his total (and what seemed mutual, given his previous attempts to befriend it) abhorrence of all H2O that came in a container too large to drink out of. What he really wanted to do right now was submerge himself in the cool water, let it envelop him entirely, even wade in so far that the waves lapped at his ears, which he hated. Then he'd drift off in a wonderful wash of blue, with the diamond sparkle of the light dancing off the surface and winking at him.

It was a truly brilliant plan. If only he'd had the energy or willpower to excecute it. Remus sat forlornly in the sand while Sirius and Peter stood awkwardly a few metres away, not talking. Peter plucked a blade of grass from the dry ground, and not bothering to brush the dirt away, gripped it between his teeth like a pipe.

The rustle of bare feet over sand alerted them to the fact that James was making his way towards them. His haystack hair was slicked backwards, and rivulets of seawater were running down his neck. The collar of his blazer was getting damp, although he didn't seem to mind that, nor the fact that there was brown seaweed clinging to the side of his glasses. He'd obviously ducked his head in a rock pool to sober up, though how effective the effort had been wasn't clear – he looked at if he was psyching himself up to do something, perhaps throw a punch. At first glance he looked composed enough, except for his hands clenching and unclenching at his sides. Remus looked up at James's face, which creased slightly as the boy wrinkled his nose, then split into a wide smile.

"I want you both to know," James said, looking as if he'd been given free tickets to every Quidditch game of the season, plus vouchers for free drinks at the pubs nearest the stadiums, "that I'm actually very happy for both of you."

"Are you all right?" Sirius asked, rushing over.

"I'm great," James said, nodding fervently, so emphatic that his face became a slight blur. Peter chewed contentedly at his blade of grass. "I'm fantastic. I'm better than that. I'm fine."

"Prongs, it's okay if you feel funny about this…"

"Funny!" James barked, grinning manically. "Who's funny. No-one's funny. I'm fine. I think it's great. It's my two best friends… you know… my two best friends…"

"Calm down, okay?" Sirius said, putting out a hand to James, who flinched, and then shook it formally.

"I'm calm. I'm cool and collected. I'm fine. You don't need to feel weird about anything, you understand? You can go back to doing… whatever you were doing. I know I interrupted last time, but-" James took a deep breath. "Whenever you need to do _things_, just do them. I won't stop you."

"We don't _need_ to do things," Sirius said, sounding stung.

"Well, you didn't _need_ to snog in front of everyone just then, but you did," James replied, his smile vanishing briefly. Peter's mouth fell open so far it grazed his knees.

"They _snogged_?" Peter said incredulously, choking unattractively on his grass. "Moony and Padfoot snogged? Why? Properly?"

"It's fine, 'Tail," James said, recovering his composure and turning his full-wattage smile back on. "It's fine. They can do whatever they want to do."

"James," Remus said quietly from the ground. He was feeling incredibly tired all of a sudden. Every single fibre in his body quivered with exhaustion.

"It's _fine_, Moony," James said not unkindly, turning the excruciatingly earnest grin onto him. James blinked, remembering something. "Where'd Evans go?" Remus made a fatigued wave in the direction of the shelter, and James nodded briskly, not meeting his eye. "I wish Dumbledore's owl would hurry up and come, so we can all go home and be normal, though," he commented to Peter as he started to make his way up the incline to the shelter. "I miss that."

Peter turned balefully to look at Sirius and Remus, pleading at them with his eyes.

"Say you're not poofs _really_," he begged. Neither of them spoke, and a parrot cried shrilly from a nearby bush. "Say it's just a prank, guys. Say –" Peter faltered. He ran up the hill to join James and Lily, not looking back once. Remus flopped backwards onto the sand and looked at the sky, which was turning Gryffindor red and gold with streaks of violet as the sun set in the west.

A long shadow fell over him, blocking out the view of the horizon. It was Sirius, looking sombre. Remus mentally steeled himself for what Sirius was going to say. It would probably be a gloomy rhetoric, along the lines of 'What have we done?'. He might suggest that they go and see what James and Lily were doing, or better, take out their aggression on Snape. He might – unthinkably – say the dreaded 'I don't think this is such a good idea', and Remus felt altogether too wearied for any kind of coherent protest, without which Sirius would just walk away…

"Move over there," Sirius grunted, and lay down next to him. Remus felt warm limbs wrap themselves around him, and the comfort of another body pressing against his back. Remus closed his eyes and relaxed into the contact, only wincing when one of Sirius's jagged nails scratched him through his shirt. The hand was promptly raised to Sirius's mouth and the offending nail bitten off. Sirius's chin was resting uncomfortably on Remus's skull, and his forearm was crossed over the smaller boy's chest. They stayed that way for a long time, while the vibrant reds faded from the sky, and the first pinpricks of distant stars came into view.

Dumbledore's second owl arrived that night.

Shortly after that, it began to rain.

* * *

Should Remus have his transformation on the island? Don't worry, I won't make him kill/bite anyone. Er.

Yes. The moon, she waxes.  
No.

What should be resolved first?

The Remus-Lily tension.  
The Sirius-James tension.  
I noticed no tension between Remus and Lily.  
I noticed no tension between Sirius and James.  
There's a difference between subtlety and 'wtf'. WHAT TENSION? WHERE?  
I am going to tick all the boxes just to spite you. Ha.

To settle a score. What is the best old-school Disney film ever?

The Little Mermaid.  
Peter Pan.  
Beauty and the Beast.  
The Lion King.  
Aladdin.  
Pinnochio.  
Cinderella.  
Snow White.  
Sleeping Beauty. 

Robin Hood 

The Aristocats 

The Sword In The Stone 

The Black Cauldron 

Snow White  
Vat iz thees 'Disney' ov vich yoo speek?  



	10. In Which A Cannibalistic Owl Features

A/N: This site doesn't let me havestrikethroughs at the end of this instalment indicate where the ink has been smudged on Dumbledore's letter and the writing can no longer be read by the Marauders. It will probably be clearer and easier to understand the Marauder's reactions to the letter with the smudge effect on my livejournal – just go to**www. livejournal . com/ users / cynicalpirate / 32814 . html #cutid1**for an easier read. (Except minus all the spaces.) Otherwise, you will see everything Dumbledore wrote, which IS NOT WHAT THE MARAUDERS SEE.Thank you so much to everyone who's been reading this, your votes are being counted – no matter how ridiculous they are – and although I have to take the majority, the suggestions have been great. Not long to go before the end, guys!

* * *

**Lord of the Guys: The Tenth Installment**

Remus felt a sharp pain on the underside of his left wrist. It woke him up, although judging from the lack of red glare behind his closed eyelids, it was still night-time. Lying in a not altogether unpleasant I-just-woke-up haze, Remus registered two things; one, Sirius was still lying next to him; and two, if he opened his eyes he would probably be violently ill. He decided not to risk it.

"Ow," he mumbled, eyes still closed, and ignored it as best he could, squirming slightly on the sand.

A few seconds later, the pain returned, with a considerable increase in ferocity. It was as if something curved and unfairly sharp was being jabbed at him. Remus made a vague shooing movement with his arm, mumbling incoherently. People – the other marauders - were always trying to jab him when he didn't want to be jabbed – with wands, with quills, with forks at _breakfast_, even. A third slash at his wrist made Remus yelp and shoot upwards, nursing his wrist. A maddened owl with dangerously bright eyes glared up at him, chattering angrily. Flecks of Remus's blood flew off its beak and stained the shadowy sand.

"You bit me," Remus whimpered to it, as a wave of headache and nausea washed over him, "Why on earth did you bite me, you insane little-"

"Hullo," said Sirius, his voice deep and heavy from sleep. Remus's violent owl-escaping movement had dislodged him somewhat. "What's going on? It's all… dark."

"Cannibalistic owl," Remus explained despondently, sucking his wrist and gazing accusingly at the winged intruder, which was proffering its leg and flapping its wings impatiently. "I need a cigarette, Sirius. I need a painkiller and a glass of water and a toilet seat and a fag and something to crush this bird with. Okay?"

"I thought only people could be cannibals," Sirius mused throatily, shaking his head so that his black locks fell and obscured his vision. "Ah. Dumbledore. Jolly… good. Untie it, shall we?" He yawned mid-sentence, rubbing his cheek.

The owl hopped from one gnarled claw to the other in a manner oddly reminiscent of Peter, who had an infamously small bladder. The Incontinence Dance. To prevent the owl defiling the huge package with half-digested vole or whatever it was voles ate, Remus untied the string. The bird seemed to glare at him evilly while it did so, then ungratefully flapped off, trailing the string behind it.

"Hey - wait for a reply!" Sirius shouted after the bird, which simply upped the speed of its wingbeats to a near-hummingbird velocity and soared upwards, its grey back tinted with moonlight. A dry breeze ruffled Remus's hair and he shivered, hugging his arms to his chest.

"Shall we open it with the others, d'you think?" Remus mumbled uncertainly into the darkness. "I'm a little foggy on the details, but I seem to remember some singularly horrific things happening."

"Snape has even more fodder for his stupid insults, Peter's a mess, Lily's a girl, which means nothing she does makes sense anyway, and James is pretending to be fine with it," Sirius clarified, sitting up. "We're in the doghouse, you and me."

"You and I," corrected Remus, turning the package over and over in his hands. "We should open this in the morning with them - and talk. We need to talk. All of us."

"Alternatively, we could kill Snape for what he said yesterday," Sirius muttered.

"I don't remember it," Remus said quickly, although yesterday was coming back to him full force…Lily's wounded face, Peter's confusion, an oddly neutral James… Snape… "And don't remind me."

A plop of something suspiciously wet landed on Remus's head. He put up a nervous hand to feel what it was, just as another few clear drops splattered down onto Sirius's face.

"Is it raining?" Remus asked hopefully. "Really raining?"

"Hallelujah," Sirius replied, sticking his tongue out to catch the drops on his tongue. The cool rain sprayed over both of them, magically banishing all mugginess from Remus's brain and making him feel wondrously light. Sirius started to sing out loud. "I'm siiiiinging in the raiiin," he crooned, pulling Remus to his feet and spinning him around in glee, "just singing in the raiiiiin. What a glorious feeeeling, I'm – bugger, the sand's turning into mud."

It was true. The sand beneath their feet had turned first damp, then unpleasantly squelchy, sticking to the soles of their feet and smushing up against itself as the rain pounded down. Unexpectedly, there was a low rumble from somewhere in the sky. Sirius and Remus looked up. The stars and moon had all but vanished, swallowed up by dark purple clouds that swirled ominously overhead.

"Let's go inside before we get soaked," Remus proposed, and the two boys scrambled up the slope to the shelter, using their arms to shield themselves from the onslaught. Remus's white shirt was damp and sticking to him, and rivulets of water were running down Sirius's back. "Ssh – we don't want to disturb the others."

The others were wide awake, and waiting for them.

"Oh, it's you," Lily said blandly, when Remus stuck his sodden head through the doorway. Thunder roared in the distance as the two boys pushed themselves through the small opening, dripping. Remus peered uncomfortably into the blackness to try and make out her face; Lily was crouched on the floor, huddled up into herself.

"The roof won't stop leaking, Lils," James's voice said from a corner. He glanced at the two boys who were still waiting by the entrance, rainwater trickling off them onto the bed of leaves on the floor. James turned away and faced Lily. What little light there was in the shelter reflected eerily off his glasses. "The rain just seeps through the branches."

"Dumbledore replied to our last owl," Remus said in a small voice, tugging out from underneath his arm and holding it out like a peace offering. Lily looked at it disdainfully, like the chief of some Amazonian tribe appraising a gold statue.

"That's good," she said finally, moving to avoid a spot where cold liquid was pooling on the floor, thanks to one of the many holes in the ceiling. "We'll read it in the morning. You know, when there's actually light to read it by."

"Where's Peter?" Sirius asked desperately. The awkwardness was becoming almost unbearable.

"Here," Peter answered in a small voice, startling them. His blue eyes flickered palely in the dim light. "I don't like storms." Snape snorted from where he was crouched, robes wrapped around him like a shawl.

"It's fine Pete, honestly," Remus said. "It's just rain. We were out in it before."

"Just makes a change from the endless heat, you know," Sirius joked. No-one laughed. There was barely enough light to see by, but Remus was willing to bet that no-one was smiling, either.

"I know," Peter said glumly. "We heard you singing."

There was a silence. A sharp wind whistled through the shelter, making Snape's robes flap and Peter's teeth chatter. Three more sections of the roof began to leak, cold rain splashing onto their faces.

"It's just a storm, Pete," James said curtly, as a crackle of lightning illuminated the room. "It'll blow over soon."

"I SAID, who fucking decided on building a fucking useless shelter if it was just going to FUCKING FALL DOWN?" Snape roared, tugging at a piece of wood ineffectually. The rain was hammering down now, pelting them so hard that it almost stung. The right side of the shelter had caved in, due to the gusts of wind that kept rattling the sticks propping it up, and in any case, everything and everyone in it was soaked through already. The sea churned madly at the end of the slope, like a boiling liquid, beating endlessly against the dark shore.

"We all FUCKING DECIDED TO BUILD THE SHELTER," Sirius roared back, trying to lift up a branch while its fronds of leaves slapped him wetly in the face. "Not that you helped much, you SLIMY GIT."

"I don't like this," Peter whined, his pyjama top pulled over his head, exposing his bellybutton. "I really don't like this."

"You're such a FUCKING TWAT, Black!" Snape snarled, abandoning his piece of wood. James, seeing this, gave him an unfriendly shove.

"Could you at least HELP, Snivellus, we're bloody _trying_ to achieve something here, and we don't need your shitty-"

"Stop swearing!" Lily shrieked, her red hair plastered to her cheeks. She threw her mangled piece of shelter to her feet as well. A crackle of lightning lit up her face, which was wearing an expression of blind fury. "We're never going to fix it, so all of you just shut up and stop bloody _swearing_!"

James, Sirius and Snape stared at her, James with sheepish embarrassment, Sirius with restrained anger and Snape with self-righteous indignation. Remus put out a tentative hand and touched Lily on the arm.

"It's going to be all right," he said, looking kindly into her face, which had rain mingled with tears running down it. "It'll be fine."

"No it won't," Lily sobbed, shaking her head. She wrapped her arms around Remus's middle and hugged him fiercely. Remus stared wildly at the others through the rain, at a loss as to what to do. Deafening thunder growled like a huge, very unfriendly dog in the black sky. The spindly trees on the beach were bent nearly double, as if bowing respectfully under the might of the storm.

"Hang it all, I can't see," James cursed, rubbing his spectacles against his drenched blazer and trying to peer through it. "I'm blind, everyone."

"We're all fucking blind," Snape retorted, wiping his face.

"I can't see _Peter_," Sirius said suddenly, looking around him in a panic. "Where is he?"

"He was whimpering about how he didn't like storms a second ago," Snape sneered. "Baby."

"You SHUT UP!" Sirius bellowed angrily.

"Peter mate, where are you?" James called out into the lashing rain. He put up an arm to try and block the harsh drops from his face, but there was no respite. "PETER!"

"WORMTAIL!" Sirius yelled. There was no reply.

"He's probably hiding in the forest," Snape shouted, making his way towards the trees. "That's where I'm going, I'm not standing out here in the rain with you lot."

"Goodfuckingriddance," Sirius scowled. He cupped his hands around his mouth like a megaphone and screamed. "WORMTAIL!"

"We can't lose Snape as well," Remus objected, stroking a weeping Lily's hair. Sirius looked skeptical. "We'll lose everybody, that way. We've got to follow him."

"I can't see," James said helplessly. "Oh Merlin – I can't _see_."

"Sirius, help James," Remus instructed, feeling oddly calm despite the awful noise. It sounded as if there had been an almighty cock-up in the gears of heaven, and the thunder was the sound of enormous gears grinding together. "Let's go."

Lily screamed shrilly as a bolt of lightning struck a huge tree down by the beach, blinding everyone in a flash of white light. It swayed dangerously for a few seconds, and then toppled heavily into the rolling waves, with bark flying in all directions.

"I feel like a drowned rat," Peter said rather cheerfully to Remus, as they surveyed the level of devastation on the beach. Half the small palms had fallen down and were dying slowly on the sand, which was strewn with leaves, small branches and squashed fruit. It was oddly normal somehow, like looking at upturned furniture. The giant tree that had been struck during the night was half submerged in the swash, pale roots sticking up crazily in the air. Other than that, the sun was shining brightly, and the waves had reverted back to their usual soothing rhythm, almost as if nothing had ever happened. The parrots squawked innocently in the branches of the remaining trees, as if to say 'Storm? Here? You must have the wrong Island, sir.'

"You shouldn't have changed into Wormtail and left us," Remus answered sternly. He still felt rather shaken. "We were worried. We were looking for you for _ages_."

"I'm sorry," Peter said, pale blue eyes widening in surprise. "It's just – I was scared. I changed into Wormtail and hid in between some rocks until it was over. Then I came back when it was safe. I didn't know you'd be so _angry_ about it." The tone of Peter's voice suggested that 'angry' was a pretty unreasonable thing to be.

"I'm not angry, exactly," Remus refused, although that was precisely what he was. "You should at least have mentioned you were going – it wasn't fair to leave everyone-"

"No-one paid any attention to me when I said I was scared," Peter said sullenly, kicking at a fallen branch and pouting. "So I just went."

"Yeah, but you can't just _go_," Remus protested. "When we need you in a crisis, you've got to-"

"YOU TWO! COME BACK!" Sirius bellowed at them from across the sand. Peter shrugged at Remus and darted off. Remus sighed, and continued wringing out his shirt, which he'd reluctantly removed. After stubbornly keeping it on through all the heat extremes the Island had thrown at him, he'd been bullied into removing it by the _rain_. It was practically see-through at any rate – and since, unlike Lily, he had no robes to protect his modesty with, he decided that topless and dry rather than clothed and clammy was the way to go.

"What is it?" Remus panted, once he'd caught up to Sirius and the rest of the group.

"Dumbledore's letter," James said, waving the damp package at him. It resembled pâpier maché somewhat. Snape rolled his eyes.

"Dumbledore's letter," Remus repeated, remembering. Then his heart sank. "But it'll be all smudged to hell. The ink will have run."

"We might as well, Remus," Lily said, emphasizing the last two syllables pointedly. Remus tried not to give too much of his relief away at the mention of his first name. Presumably he'd been forgiven – for whatever it was he'd _done_. Instead, he coughed in embarrassment and sat down as James painstakingly peeled apart the envelope.

_DRACO DORMIENS NUNQUAM TITILLANDUS  
Hogwarts School of Wit hcraft and Wizardry_

My dear children,

I do hope you are not starving to death. I have enclosed some more Sherbet Lemons for your consumption, and like the first batch, they also have been charmed with nourishment spells, so you need not worry your heads about procuring other foodstuffs unless you grow weary of the lemon flavour - I know I never do.

The Minister was most displeased (as were the majority of your parents, dear students – I have notified them also) to hear of your little jaunt. Nevertheless, I have managed to authorise a Portkey and shall be arriving in three days' time to pick you up. I myself have stressed that time is of the essence, but the Minister alleges that there is simply nothing to be done about it – although I am fighting as hard as I can to prove him wrong on that count.

There of course is a reason why three days is not a satisfactory amount of time for you to continue to be stranded. I suddenly find myself in a quandary, dear students, as to protect you all now means I must_ breach Mr. Lupin's confidentiality arrangement. Naturally, this is something I am loath__ to do, but as this matter concerns your personal safety as a whole, I am putting _absolute faith_ in your maturity and capability to handle this situation. The eminently distressing fact that the full moon occurs in two days' time has not escaped my attention - although it may have yours. I emphasise, do _not_ panic. _

Mr. Lupin will be undergoing his transformation at that time. You are to give him the potion I have enclosed a few hours beforehand, which will – hopefully – sedate him, though it will not_ prevent the transition from boy to wolf. I want you all to remember during this time that nothing matters more than _your own personal safety_. Regrettably, I cannot alter whatever course of action you choose to take to handle this, but I am certainly going to propose what your decision should be. I urge you to be pr__actical, rather than emotional when considering it. Lives are at stake; this is _not the time _for dramatics. _

Bind Mr. Lupin to something sturdy, with all four limbs attached to a separate entity, such as a tree or rock. This method has been used effectively in the past to restrain sufferers of lycanthropy. The knots should be as tight as possible, as when the boy has undergone his transformation he will be significantly stronger and able to untie loose bindings. At this point you should evacuate the area_, and in no circumstances _whatsoever_ should _any_ of you remain with him or return to him when this happens. The safest place to go would be somewhere the wolf cannot reach – either a very high point one would need human dexterity to climb up to, or a spot surrounded by deep water. Do _not_ leave this sanctuary until sunrise, at which point you may go and tend to Mr. Lupin's injuries. I will be arriving shortly afterwards, and he shall be taken to the infirmary the minute we return to Hogwarts. _

I am placing Mr. Potter in charge until I arrive. None_ of you are to question his authority. You are to co-operate with each other at all times. The owl has brought a package containing the necessary potion, charmed ropes – they cannot fray or snap, a tin of sherbet lemons and some rudimentary Healing paraphernalia. I also believe you requested some clothing. I will be with you in three days. Constant vigilance._

_Yours sincerely,  
Albus Dumbledore_

"You were right, Remus," James said weakly, throwing the sodden parchment to the ground. "No point in reading it – it's all smudged to hell."

"No, it's fine," Remus answered stiffly. "I understand it perfectly."

* * *

Poll Number 10. 

To echo Dumbledore - please choose practically and realistically, rather than emotionally. Should they bind Remus?

Hell no.  
Yes, because it's safer for everyone.

Should either Snape or Peter be redeemed?

Hell no. Too OOC.  
Snape. Because he's a good guy.  
Peter. Because he's cute.  
Both. Because I am a fluffwhore.

The Lion King won the 'Best Disney Film' poll last time. But, as everyone with a teaspoon of sense knows, it's really Aladdin. coughs discreetly HAPPY VOTING!


	11. In Which There Is Hardcore Bondage

**Lord of the Guys: The Eleventh Installment**

"I thought the full moon wasn't for about two weeks," Peter mumbled, looking nervous.

"We've been on this _island_ for two weeks," Lily muttered, biting agitatedly at a hangnail on her left hand. "Nearly. I've been keeping count."

"Well, at least we still have two days left," Peter said hopefully.

"This letter is dated two days ago," Snape scowled. "Either the owl got lost, or it inexplicably took it a _little bit longer_ to fly out here, due to us being Not in Scotland but rather Somewhere Where the Sun Shines for More Than Forty-Five Minutes Each Day."

"What are we going to do?" Peter asked shrilly. He looked at James, who averted his eyes. "What are we going to do?"

"Calm down," Sirius growled from behind gritted teeth. "James, tell him." He, too, glanced at James, who was concentrating deeply on pouring the handful of white sand he was holding from one hand to the other. A waterfall of pale beads spilled through his fingers and onto his open palm.

James's main job in life, as far as the others were considered, was to be was the unofficial leader of the Marauders. It was an unquestionable, inalienable fact that Prongs ruled the roost. James held the four boys together like glue, like messy-haired, jovial, energetic glue with intolerably scrawled handwriting. In difficult situations Sirius could bluster ahead on his own easily enough, admittedly thinking up the most radical and implausible suggestions along the way. Remus was much better at being diplomatic; he soothed situations and helped the others see clearly. Peter might sway the final outcome of a tough decision, he was certainly persistent enough when pressing his points to make them take notice, but still. _James_ made the final choices - _he_ was the one they trusted to pull things off, to somehow _fix_ things, to stick the broken pieces together and make things work again. None of them begrudged him this power, because the small print at the end of the 'Leader' contract often turned out to be much longer than the contract itself.

Unfortunately, neither Snape nor Lily had been informed of James's indisputable authority upon joining the group, and were suitably indignant at Dumbledore's decision.

"Why choose Potter, for Christ's sake?" Snape scowled. "Why is _he_ in charge?"

"Who else?" blurted Peter, genuinely nonplussed.

"It's blatant favouritism, idiot," Snape retorted, through gritted teeth. "It has nothing to do with Potter's actual _capability_ in the role."

"He saved your life once before," Peter said indignantly, eyeing Snape like a kicked poodle. He picked up some debris from the storm earlier and toyed with it. Snape paused momentarily, then shrugged, licking his dry lips before answering.

"I still think it's insanity to put all our lives in his hands. He's an incompetent _git_." Snape shot James a look that wasn't so much ugly as grotesquely deformed. Peter yanked a clump of earth out of the ground by some straggly shoots of grass, just as everyone began to talk again, beginning their sentences in loud, clamorous voices.

"But it's only–"

"He's just going to-"

"You must think–"

"I'm just confused as to why Dumbledore didn't choose _me_," Lily interrupted quietly. All the boys save James and Remus stopped mid-babble and turned to gawk unattractively at her. "I mean, for a start, his decision completely undermines the Prefect hierarchy… and as obviously Remus can't… well, it wouldn't be fair to let him… but I don't see why…"

James stopped palming the sand, and let it trickle gently into a miniature dune between his feet before speaking.

"You what?"

"I just think Dumbledore might've chosen someone with experience in these things, that's all."

"You don't think I'm capable enough to be put in charge?"

"I never said that," Lily replied quickly. James laughed mirthlessly, a short, croaky hiccup of a laugh, the kind of laugh an asthmatic frog might give if someone told it a 'Knock, knock' joke.

"That's what you implied, Lily."

There was a break for a few uncertain seconds, and then Sirius grabbed the damp parchment, smudging an already streaky word into oblivion with his thumb.

"Look," he said firmly, pointing to the relevant sentence, "Dumbledore says we should put Prongs in charge, so that's what we'll do, alright?" Snape made a face at the familiar nickname, one he loathed not least because he couldn't fathom its origin.

"With all due respect, i.e. _none_," Snape responded, "If the man who wants to put a lunatic like 'Prongs' in charge is the same man who's sent us nothing more sustaining than _Muggle sweets_ the whole time we've been here, then I have serious qualms about his judgement."

"You should try the sherbet lemons, you know," Peter interjected kindly. "You don't feel as hungry once you've had a few."

"They're fucking balls of _sugar_!" Snape exploded.

"Look if you want, we can vote on who gets to take charge," Lily suggested, scratching a freckle on her cheek.

"Voting? Fat chance," Snape sneered. "None of these idiots are going to vote for me, thank you very much. They're bloody biased, anyway."

"So you _really_ don't think I can take charge?" James said suddenly, dusting his hands off on his boxers in indignation and turning to look at Lily. "Why on earth d'you think that?"

"I don't think that!" Lily protested, flustered.

"I think you should pull your head out of your arse, Potter," Snape grimaced, snatching at the letter. It ripped squelchily, making a large tear a third of the way down its middle. The company stared at it dumbly.

"I think-" Peter began tentatively.

"Nobody _cares_ what you think!" Sirius yelled, standing up and kicking a flurry of dust and gravelly sand into the air. "No-one really gives a fuck, especially not _me_. You know what_I_ think? _I_ think we should hear what Remus thinks, since the whole bloody letter concerns _him_. Yeah? That is, if you lot can stop arguing for _five seconds_ about who gets to boss everyone else around!"

There was an abashed silence.

"And I _also_ think," Sirius continued at a slightly saner volume, one that would perhaps _not_ prompt half-deaf Eskimos at the North Pole to wish he would keep his voice down, "that we should remember no matter how worse it is, bad it is I mean, for us, it's going to be so much_bloody worse_ for him."

"It's all right, Sirius," Remus said from below him.

"If you're quite done defending your _boyfriend_," Snape muttered.

"I fucking am," Sirius agreed, and sat down, cheeks flushed.

"It's all right," Remus said again slowly. "I just think – You know I wouldn't want to hurt any of you – especially not Lily. So if I have to be bound to a – a tree or something, then I'll do it, don't worry. Just as long as things aren't unnecessarily unpleasant for you lot."

"Oh, and being tied to a tree with ropes for a whole night isn't unnecessarily unpleasant at all," Sirius burst out sarcastically.

"It's the only option we have," Remus continued, with measured calm. "Tie me up, and then get far away from me as possible."

"Black, don't pout," Snape sneered, noticing at Sirius's maudlin expression. "_Surely_ you're not thinking about endangering all our lives to keep a _werewolf's_ comfort levels on the up."

"No, merely thinking how to murder you and make it look like an accident," Sirius said curtly. He looked at Remus gently. "Couldn't you really _hurt_ yourself doing that rope thing? If the wolf is going to be flailing about, couldn't you… wrench something important out of its socket?"

"Don't go scaring him off doing it!" Peter squealed, nudging Sirius.

"You sure you want to do this, mate?" James enquired earnestly. "Because I'm not going to force you to do anything you don't want to do."

Remus looked at James, who gazed back from behind three millimetres of glass, brown eyes wide.

"I'm sure," he nodded, and saw the eyes crinkle up at the corners with relief. He almost felt the warm whoosh of air brush past his back as the group collectively exhaled.

"Now what?" Snape asked after a pregnant pause.

"Hold on," James said, taking off his glasses and polishing them on his chest. "Just give me a moment to think." He screwed his face up in concentration and swivelled to face the ocean, leaving the Remus and the four others to wait uncomfortably.

None of them said anything. The silence was almost tangible; Remus could have reached out and touched it – or perhaps throttled it – if he'd wanted to. He could feel them all glancing at him, either in pity or self-righteous disgust, but if he moved his head a fraction in their directions, their eyes would slide off him guiltily and land on the sand. James was doing his 'thinking' hum; a low, rhythmic 'nuhnuhnuhnuhnuhnuhnuh' sound made with his tongue. Sirius had often reflected that it sounded extraordinarily like an action hero's theme tune– and if only James had had better hair or superpowers, he could've been TurboTosser or perhaps SuperPrat. Snape was impatiently finger-drumming out what sounded like a frenetic rock ballad, his fingers thudding madly against the ground. Peter was mouth-breathing gusts of hot air everywhere as he uprooted the nearby vegetation, clumps of yellowed ferns in his hands. Every tiny sound Remus could hear reverberated like a huge gong, saying exactly what their lack of words didn't. _WE'RE SCREWED_.

"Right," James announced decisively, after what seemed like an hour. "This is the plan. We're going to split into groups of _three_: me, Remus, Snape and then Sirius, Peter and Lily. Right. Remus, Snape and I will look for a spot to tie Remus up while _you_ three will find a place a good bit away which is as… _werewolf-proof_ as possible. It's where we'll be going to spend the night once Remus is – well - tied up. Er. Don't forget to take a break and have something to eat –"

"Eat what?" Snape scoffed. "We going to go fishing again? More unripe fruit? _Sherbet bloody lemons_?"

"As I was _saying_, eat something after an hour or so. Then we'll move any stuff we saved from the old camp before it blew down–"

"A wet blazer and someone's filthy socks," sniffed Snape.

"AS I WAS SAYING, we'll get the stuff we saved, move it to the safe place, come back to bind Remus, and then we'll go to the sanctuary and wait for sunrise and Dumbledore, for when he arrives –"

"To pick up the bodies," Snape finished. James glared daggers at him.

"Just _do_ it, Snivellus, or –" Lily winced at the nickname, and James drew himself short. He took a deep breath, and with the self-restraint usually only exercised by Jain monks, said, "Snape, _please_. We have to co-operate." He was rewarded for this maturity by a quick smile from Lily, making him tug at his hair in embarrassment.

"Hey, you know what this means?" Peter piped up, as the six of them rose resignedly to their feet. "It's going to be our very last night on the Island."

"I doubt we'd have this much bother if it was _Evans's_ time of the month," Snape joked dryly, as they surveyed the beach for suitable trees or rocks . Remus and James exchanged glances, because they both felt that their present ones just weren't incredulous enough.

"Perhaps you shouldn't talk," James suggested finally, as he shoved a tree trunk to see whether it would possibly hold a fully-grown wolf. "It might make people hate you less. You should look into it."

Remus felt slightly strange, picking out the spot where he was to be imprisoned for the night. It was like helping an executioner select the axe with which to chop off your head – 'No, not that one, nice handle but it's far too blunt and I don't like the colour' or 'Ooh, yes, I particularly like the paper-thin sides and the swishy sound when you swing it through the air'. Rather a lot of the trees they found seemed to have been damaged by the storm, and were too precariously near to falling themselves to be of any use.

"Lupin, are you even listening to me?" Snape asked irritably, as he kicked away some loose earth. "I was _saying_ that if we can't find four separate points for each of your limbs, we could always just strap you to a tree and put an extra coil round your neck to stop you biting yourself free."

"OK," Remus said faintly. He looked around for an escape, lest he was expected to make constructive contributions to the conversation. He felt slightly nauseous already. "Er. James, what are you doing?" James looked up distractedly from behind the length of rope, the tail of which was trailing behind him.

"Practising my knots, of course," James said, smiling weakly. "We want you to be secure, don't we?"

For some reason, Snape was the one orchestrating Remus's bondage. Once they'd found a suitable tying spot, Snape had sort-of casually suggested that they 'just get it over with', and James had reluctantly agreed to tying Remus up before going back to join the others. It was quite obvious Snape had intended to do this from the beginning. What he'd actually meant by his 'better to be safe than sorry' spiel was, he didn't want any of the others - Lily or Sirius in particular, Remus suspected, Lily for her melodramatic girl-ness and Sirius for his temper – seeing Remus trussed up like a turkey and getting all emotional and/or violent. Remus also had the feeling that Snape thought he might chicken out and refuse to be bound if he had enough time to think about it. Remus wasn't about to chicken out, though – he already felt enough like a farmyard bird as it was.

"Take that shirt off first," Snape ordered with all the impassioned calm of a school matron. He pointed to Remus's shirt, which he'd donned again the instant it was passably dry. Remus reluctantly fumbled with the buttons and shrugged it off, then stood there, clutching each elbow tightly with the opposite hand. He looked down at himself self-consciously, and realised he had faint but distinct tan lines from the sun. Ones that ended where his forearms did.

"And that too," Snape added, pointing at Remus's trousers, the owner of which looked flabbergasted. "It'll _rip_ otherwise, you moron."

"I _know_," Remus snapped in annoyance tinged with fear, lowering his hands. It looked as if he'd dipped his arms up to the elbow in runny honey, whereas the rest of him was as pale as parchment. "I _have_ done this before." Remus paused again, his fingers frozen on the metal zip. "Are you going to _watch_?"

"I'm going to have to tie you up once James gets back with the ropes," Snape sighed in a long-suffering manner. "You're wasting time, Lupin. You can keep your boxers on."

"I should hope so," James said in an admirable attempt at cheerfulness, returning absolutely laden with thin, yellowed ropes. "These cords seem to be in good condition, so it should be fairly easy to – you know, Remus, that's the nakedest I've seen you in ages. Bloody amazing."

"I'm just wondering what position we should put him in," Snape stated coldly. He shook his head, and his greasy locks bounced off his shoulders. "Flat on his back, or on his knees... could always do it standing, I suppose."

"Well, surely we'll do whatever's most comfortable for Remus," James said slowly, as if Snape were thicker than the mud on the Quidditch pitches in November, which was infamously squelchy. He glanced at Remus, who was watching the two from a distance as they discussed him. "Nice knees you've got there, mate. Knobbly."

"Only if that's the position the _werewolf_ will find it hardest to escape from," Snape said officiously, drawing James's attention back to the conversation. "He's not going to be himself for half the night – I hardly think the human's comfort is important."

"Well, I do," James smiled unpleasantly. "And _I'm_ in charge, Snivellus."

"Careful Lily doesn't hear you calling me that," Snape taunted. James bit his lip, and made a face that suggested he was swallowing armadillo bile.

"Let's just get this over with, shall we?"

"_What_?" Sirius hissed at James, as Lily, Peter and Snape strode ahead of them through the undergrowth. "We're not going to go to Moony tonight?"

"We can't," James said, doggedly beating his way past a particularly clingy fern. He swatted at a mosquito hovering tantalisingly above his head and missed, whacking himself on the skull. "Owch."

"He's tied up – he'll _need_ us to be there to distract him, Prongs."

"I have to take care of Lily," James said resolutely. "And in any case, those two _can't_ know we're Animagi. Not even Dumbledore knows that."

"They wouldn't have to know… We can take turns to go to him and check –"

"_No_," James protested. "It wouldn't work. It's not safe. We're staying together, and that's final."

"I haven't even _seen_ him since you sent us off to find the sanctuary. You and Snape just dragged us away, we didn't even say _goodbye_to Moony."

"Don't be so melodramatic," James snapped, forgetting to keep his voice low. "It's not _goodbye-forever_. It's goodbye-for-a-short-while-old-chum. He'll probably sleep right through it, he's taken the potion."

"Why are you being such a tosser?" Sirius questioned angrily. "He's supposed to be your friend."

"Well, he's _your_ boyfriend." James said irritably. "So obviously I can't really care that Moony's alone out there, strapped to a tree." Sirius looked nonplussed.

"Erm, what? How did we get onto this?"

"I clearly don't love Moony as much as you do, because as the two of you are _shagging_ now, it means you've got this special bond."

"Is that what you're being such an arse about? You don't want to help Remus because we kissed? That's _shit_, Potter." James stopped in his tracks, and shoved Sirius fiercely, whispering in fury. The sounds of the others receded somewhat into the distance.

"Of _course_ I care that Remus is alone out there, and of _course_ I know what a shitty time he's probably having of it, and of _course_ I'm worried about him being wrapped up like a bloody parcel tonight. But I am _not_ going to leave Lily in danger, and I am _not_ going to disobey Dumbledore, and I am _not_ going to risk cocking this up, do you _understand_?"

Sirius stared at him.

"I'm sorry," he said humbly. James nodded, breathing heavily through his nose. "So. Are you really messed up by me and Remus?"

"The short answer's _yes_," James responded, rubbing his forehead tiredly. "It's just… I thought I knew everything about you. And now there's this whole new fucking side to you and it's all _weird_, mate. I know you're not different, but it feels like you are. And I want to be happy for you, I really do, but… but. You know you're my best friend, Sirius, you always will be."

"I understand," Sirius said. "I think." James grinned in grateful relief and adjusted his glasses awkwardly.

"I think we should hug or something now, mate, only I'm scared of turning you on."

Sirius grinned, and offered his hand. James took it awkwardly, then pulled him into a huge bear-hug, ending with a decidedly heterosexual punch on the arm. "Come on; let's catch up with the others."

"I'm not coming," Sirius replied. James's face fell.

"C'mon mate, don't do this… Dumbledore left me in charge."

"I want to come with you, I really do," Sirius said, backing away through the ferns, "but you've got to take care of the others, and I've got to go to Remus."

"James!" Lily's voice called through the trees. James's head whipped sideways in the direction it came from. "Are you and Black _coming_? We're nearly there." James looked at Sirius. Sirius looked back at James.

"You're my best friend, James. You always will be," Sirius choked, and disappeared into the trees. James stared after him blankly.

"Oh _fucking_ Merlin, Remus!" Sirius exclaimed, aghast, pushing the shadowy hair out of his eyes as he neared the four trees. He repeated the name over and over again, as if drumming an incantation into his head for an exam. "Remus, _Remus_, Remus, Remus."

"Oh, hello," Remus smiled brightly from his seat on the ground, twisting his chafed wrist to make it less visible. He'd been wriggling his arm in his bonds, trying to gauge how much it would hurt when he transformed. The answer turned out to be: quite a lot. "Can't chat now, I'm afraid. I'm a bit tied up at the moment." Remus laughed briefly, then coughed. "It's rather breezy in the evenings without a shirt, don't you find? But shirts are so stuffy, and they don't do much for a tan. What I need is a tank top of some sort. Or a sweater-vest." Sirius stopped about a foot away from Remus, as if scared to come closer, and his lips were still moving in horror, silently mouthing his name. Remus faltered. "Christ, don't stare at me like that. What is it?"

"Sorry." Sirius recovered his composure, blinking. "Can you stand up – or anything?" Remus grinned conspiratorially.

"I tried a while ago – with quite intriguing effects. Can't really do much unless I'm crouched over, not with these _things_ attached to my arms and legs." Remus demonstrated, and Sirius could see that he could only stand bent double with his knees crooked, as if he were carrying a staggeringly heavy sack on his shoulders. The slight ridges of spine jutted out in his back, and the knots were sickeningly tight, cutting savagely into his ankles and wrists. "I can now do a mean Hunchback of Notre Dame impression, though. I would show you, only the bloody potion's making me too sleepy to handle a French accent." Sirius was still staring at him, wearing that despondent, pitying expression, and Remus beamed wider to reassure him, pressing on with the one-sided conversation. "Would kill for a fag, though. You managed to rustle up _booze_ on this island, think you could find us a smoke? Though I expect it'd be more of the marijuana variety, wouldn't it?"

"You look terrible," Sirius managed. Remus's smile slipped, as did his feet, and he fell awkwardly to the ground.

" I _was_ hoping the spot wasn't all that noticeable," Remus puffed, once he'd righted himself back into his original 'arched back' pose. "Now, seriously. Sirius. Go back to the others, okay? You shouldn't be here. It's dangerous."

"You shouldn't _smoke_," Sirius said obstinately, kneeling beside him. "That's dangerous."

"I'll quit smoking if you leave right now," Remus said earnestly, staring hard into Sirius's grey eyes. "I'll throw away my packs and become one of those odd social smokers who bum cigarettes from everyone else."

"I'm not going anywhere."

"Or I'll only smoke when I'm drunk, like you and Peter."

"No."

"I'll give up completely," Remus promised, elaborating. "If a crazed mugger put his wand to my head and told me that the only way to save my own life would be to finish his cigarette for him, I'd die a martyr. A martyr with clean, healthy lungs. But only as long as you leave straight away."

"Look, I won't."

Remus tucked his head into himself so that his chin touched his chest. His narrow shoulders shook, and he made a snuffling sound that sounded strangely like laughter. After a few seconds he straightened his neck again, dry-eyed but desperate.

"This is so bloody _humiliating_, Sirius. Bugger. I'm drugged to the gills and tied up like a particularly vicious cat on its way to be spayed, or something. D'you know how awful it is, not only that Evans _knows_, but that she's going to see me in the morning, afterwards? D'you know how awful it is for _you_ to have seen me like this?"

"Like what, without a shirt?" Sirius asked. Remus stared at him in disbelief. "That was a joke," Sirius clarified lamely. "Ha. Funny."

"Oh," Remus said blankly. He smiled, and for the first time since Sirius had turned up, the smile reached his eyes. "Now I come to think of it, that is pretty mortifying in itself. I mean, everyone can see my _chest_. Not to mention my knees – and I'd rather we didn't mention _them_. James already did, he reminded me how knobbly they are."

"They're not kn… well. Um. You've… got a nice chest," Sirius offered generously. Remus eyed him beadily, giving a look that told Sirius full well he would have poked him in the ribs had he only the control of his hands.

"It's just a chest," Remus shook his head evenly, feeling warm mugginess settle on him. It was not unlike the palm-wine induced haze, but this seemed less dozy and more insistent. Like a barrage of intoxicatingly soft sleep-walls boxing him into a corner. "Nothing more… nothing less. Just an ordinary, run-of-the-mill abdominal-pectoral set."

Sirius put out a trembling hand and touched Remus's cheek gently. It was cool and soft, his fingers feeling impossibly hot and heavy in comparison. Sirius traced the angular line of Remus's clenched jaw with his little finger. Sirius's thumb came to rest on the boy's cheekbone, which was wet. There was a damp streak there, still glistening in the rays of the dying sun.

"Hey, Pads," Remus whispered hoarsely, certain he was about to say the single most horrendously embarrassing thing any teenage boy ever dared voice aloud, "I'm scared shitless. I'm scared the others will hate me for this… I'm scared the bloody ropes won't hold and I'll hurt someone. I remember when I was ten and my uncle told my mum the best way to deal with me was to tie me up. I broke my shoulder. I'm scared I'll hurt myself again. I'm _scared_."

"I am too," Sirius replied, in equally hushed tones. "But you'll be okay. It'll be okay, Moony."

"You're really not leaving, are you?" Remus asked in dazed amazement. Sirius shook his head. "You can stay with me 'til I fall… asleep then. Shouldn't be long – then you can go back to the others. I'll be fine." Remus tilted his neck to the side awkwardly, and it took a few seconds for his friend to work out exactly what it was he was doing.

"If you sleep like that, you'll get a crick in the neck when you wake up," Sirius eventually observed, nudging Remus's head upright.

"When I wake up, a crick… in the neck will be the very _least_ of my worries," Remus said, trying to yawn but finding it took too much energy. "I can't exactly lie comfortably like this, though."

"I'll support you," Sirius said, scrambling sideways into a position where Remus could lean on his shoulder. "If you just lean your head… and kind of snuggle in… there. Better?"

"Better," Remus murmured, his light brown hair tickling Sirius's collarbone. "But the rope's drawn tight against your – aren't you uncomfortable?" Sirius shook his head slightly, so as not to be decapitated by the taut rope.

"It's fine."

"It's the waiting that's the worst," Remus mused, after a short while. "Waiting for the damn light to fade and the full moon to rise… I feel like a man on death row, killing time before his execution."

"Any last requests?" Sirius murmured, his lips pressed against Remus's scalp.

"A cigarette would be nice, if you're offering."

"Where's Sirius?" Peter asked, his face oddly sallow in the gloom of the cave. James closed his eyes briefly, seeking some respite from the situation, then opened them again. It wasn't a bad dream; he was still there, and worse, he couldn't throw a tantrum or make negative remarks or sulk. He was In Charge, and that meant Being Responsible.

"That doesn't matter now. We can't leave here until morning."

"I want to know where Sirius is too," Lily said, leaning against the wall. Her face looked frightened. James put out a hand and stroked her hair instinctively. She didn't flinch, merely shuddered into the touch and stared out at the black shadow-water spilling in from the gaping mouth of the cave.

"He's obviously with the werewolf," Snape said calmly. "At least _his_ is the only life he's gambling, that way."

"Why did you let him go? Will he come back before the moon rises?" Peter asked shrilly. Icy water trickled down from a stalactite on the ceiling. The place stank of dead fish, the tiny bones of which crunched ominously underfoot. James sighed heavily.

"I don't know, Peter."

"So he's going to spend all night with Moony?"

"I said I didn't know, Peter."

"Were circumstances different," Snape's lazy voice drifted to them from the corner, "one could assume they would be quite pleased to get the beach to themselves. Romantic, you know."

"Is all you can do sneer and make snide comments?" Lily asked Snape pointedly, wiping slime from the cave's slick walls off her skirt. "Aren't you scared?"

"I'm not scared of any of them," Snape replied, his voice oddly hollow. It echoed softly. _Scared_. _Scared_. _Them_. Lily snorted, and then looked at James, who was staring fixedly at the cave entrance.

"You can go and get him, if you want," Lily said kindly. Peter made a small, involuntary noise, and Snape looked up from where he was stationed in the shadows. James continued to stare at the stone doorway, willing Sirius's head to poke through it. James would be obliged to throw a punch at said head when it _did_ make an appearance, of course, but he still wished it would. More than anything.

"He knows where we are, if he wants to come back," James answered finally. "I'm not leaving you."

There was a brief silence again, before Snape made the sound of someone being very noisily sick.

Sirius smiled sadly at Remus, who was fast asleep. He actually looked… almost _peaceful_. The trail of the single tear had dried on his cheek, but his eyes were closed and there was something that might have been the smudge of a smile on his face. Edging himself out from underneath Remus's head, Sirius picked up one of his hands to examine the boy's bitten nails. It was becoming increasingly hard to see in the darkness, but something caught his eye.

Remus's wrist underneath the bindings was a raw, angry pink colour, due to Remus's earlier wriggling of his arm in the bonds. The delicate skin there had been broken, and tiny flecks of blood adorned the skin above the vein. Sirius squeezed Remus's hand painfully hard, feeling the gentle ridges of the chewed nails with his finger.

The moon was just beginning to rise over the water. Gently at first, then more and more urgently, Sirius began to tug at the ropes.

* * *

**Poll#11**

_Just curious, where do most of your sympathies lie?_

With James.  
With Lily.  
With Sirius.  
With Peter.  
With Remus.  
With Snape.  
With Dumbledore.  
With the crabs.  
None of the above.

_Pick a word. It will influence the finale installment, but I won't tell you how. I'll be really surprised if anyone guesses WHAT the words could influence, because they are very tenuous links!_

Hula.  
Squidgy.  
Poke.  
Cracker.

* * *

**Author's note:** Thanks to everyone who's commenting - your reviews are all so amusing and nice. If you're reading this, drop me a line and tell me what you think? It's great to have such cool readers on as well as livejournal - you help me along with the polls hugely. --tacklehugs you all-- Also, rather touched that some of you read it even when it was underlined (have fixed, now). It was just my computer being a bit of a tosser. 


	12. In Which Peter Cracks A Joke

**Lord of the Guys: The Last** **Installment**

Dog.

Sirius is the dog and the dog is Sirius. Remus is the wolf but the wolf is not Remus. That's the difference. That's the problem.

Sometimes Padfoot the dog tries to take over. Sometimes Padfoot wants to chase and bark and play and bite and growl and scratch and be scratched and run and shag and eat and drink and dig and howl. Sometimes Sirius even enjoys it, and chases or barks or plays or bites or growls or scratches or is scratched or runs or eats or drinks or digs or howls. But that's because Sirius is in control, and because he _wants_ to. That's the difference.

There is a boy here. He is tied up, and he is sitting on the ground with his head down so that his hair is falling over his face. He smells familiar, because he is Moony. Moony smells like biscuits and parchment and coffee and cigarettes, and Padfoot likes his smell the best.

Moony is moaning softly. Padfoot cannot tell if he is asleep or awake, but he wants to help. He goes over to Moony and licks his face, breathing his hot dog breath onto his cheek. Licking always helps. Moony stops moaning, but then his eyes open all of a sudden and the white moon is reflected in them and they are staring straight through Padfoot.

Moony's body is beginning to move slightly now, in shudders and ripples. His limbs are lengthening in quick spurts and moving into awkward positions. Thorny hair pushes itself up from underneath his skin. It is not like the boy is growing; it is like some monster deep inside the boy is forcing itself to the surface. The monster writhes around inside the boy, and the thing that was Moony is making noises. Horrible noises that bang around in Padfoot's brain and make him bark madly to block them out.

Soon, only the wolf is left crouched there. He pays no attention to Padfoot, because he is trapped in the ropes, which are holding his limbs at obscene angles to his body. The wolf is not howling, but screaming. He writhes around in his ropes, which are flapping in the air and tangling in low branches. The wolf bites down on the cords, but nothing happens. He gnaws on the rope shackling his front paw, and ends up tearing the soft flesh there instead of his bindings. Hot wolf blood trickles to the ground. Padfoot can smell it.

Somehow, after a lifetime of howling, the wolf manages to free both his front paws. Only his back ones remain tied. He snaps viciously at Padfoot, saliva dripping from his jaws, and tugs hard. The earth around him is rising up into the air in flurries where he dislodges it. It tumbles down into their fur like brown hail.

Padfoot wants to reason with the wolf that is not Remus. He wags his tail slowly and woofs. But the wolf is angry and snapping and biting and flailing and a wag, no matter how judiciously timed, is simply not going to work. Padfoot changes his mind and adopts the 'fuck-off' stance of the canines, teeth bared, body tensed and growl. The wolf is not listening. The wolf is angry. Padfoot is not angry. Padfoot would much rather wag his tail. But the only other option is to lie down in submission like a stupid gay poodle and expose his belly, and Padfoot is not about to do _that_. Quite apart from the dominant pack-member issues he has, rolling over might just get his stomach ripped to shreds.

The wolf has freed his left hind leg, heaving as hard as he can against the trees. They creak ominously as he jerks, their branches bending. The last knot is loose around his lower right leg. The wolf stops suddenly. He walks backwards a few paces, then sprints towards Padfoot at full speed, leaping into the air. His paws sail over Padfoot as he jumps.

The rope yanks the wolf back, and he falls to the ground with a yelp, collapsing on top of Padfoot. There is a _crack_. It is the sound of bone mashing against itself. The wolf whimpers, struggling to stand up again, and his sharp claws rake Padfoot's back. The wolf hobbles away, limping and snarling, then turns easily and pulls off the last loop of rope with his teeth. The rope falls to the floor.

_SHIT_, Padfoot thinks. The wolf limps towards him, angry, and then pounces. Padfoot ducks at the last minute and dives away. The wolf follows him. Padfoot knows how to play this game. Padfoot runs away, and then the wolf catches him. It's like Tig, except Padfoot is far too clever to ever get caught. They run down onto the shady beach, kicking up big clouds of sand. The wolf growls at the water and Padfoot barks happily in response. The moonlight is reflecting off the waves and turning the sea silver. Padfoot runs to the shore and rolls playfully in the cool wet swash. By the time Padfoot gets up, the wolf has disappeared into the trees.

_SHIT_, Padfoot thinks again, dripping.

Padfoot can't find the wolf anywhere. He can smell him, and he can hear him, but the wolf is much faster than he is, and the wolf doesn't want to be found. Padfoot rushes through the ferns, following his nose. There are too many scents in the forest – of trees and sap and animal droppings and pollen and fruit and mud and vomit and PRONGS WORMTAIL EVANS SNAPE. Padfoot stops. He is outside the cave, on the other side of the island. There are people inside the cave and Padfoot is meant to be protecting them. No, he is meant to be protecting Moony. Padfoot walks closer to the cave, sniffing inquisitively. Someone screams, and Padfoot dives into a bush, alarmed.

"What's the matter?" A voice asks from inside the cave. It is Prongs. Padfoot wants to run at Prongs and lick him soundly, but he stays where he is.

"I thought it was… it was… I saw a black tail or something," a girl says. It is Evans. "It ran away when I screamed."

"The wolf wouldn't run away if you screamed," Wormtail says. "He'd come in and eat you."

"We have to keep quiet," Prongs says again. There is the sound of someone retching behind him, and the smell of fresh vomit washes over Padfoot again. "Snape, you must've eaten something awful."

"There's nothing edible on this island that _isn't_ awful," Snape's voice says. "Why do we have to keep quiet if Remus – the wolf – is tied up?"

There is a noise to Padfoot's left. He looks up in its direction, and sees the wolf, stalking the cave. He thinks an extremely rude word for the third time that night.

"It's a precaution, you div," Prongs says harshly. "We have to be safe."

Padfoot is puzzled. He finds it difficult to think about what will happen, and the consequences of his actions, though admittedly when he's _not_ a dog he rarely thinks about that. Padfoot deals in now. But now has got him nowhere, and if he doesn't make the wolf change direction they _will_ all be in deep shit. Only, he remembers, the others can't know he's a dog. Padfoot growls almost silently, deep in his throat. The wolf looks at him with its bottomless black eyes. Padfoot barks twice, taunting him.

"What was that?" Evans whispers instantly. "I heard something barking!"

"It was the wolf," Snape coughs, his voice ragged. The wolf moves a few steps towards the bush where Padfoot is hiding, away from the cave. Padfoot growls encouragingly. "We're all going to die."

"Stop being so melodramatic," Prongs snaps. "It's not the wolf."

"What else on this island barks?" Snape hisses. He laughs. "Who's afraid of the big bad wolf? Tralalalalaaa."' The wolf is moving closer to the bush, away from the others. Padfoot wishes Snape would have the sense to shut up and stop singing. Then Prongs says something surprising.

"I'll go and check, if you like."

"Don't!" Two voices say together. They belong to Evans and Wormtail, and they are high-pitched with fear. Prongs pays them no heed, and his footsteps, splashing through the puddles on the cave floor, get louder and louder. The wolf turns its head with barely concealed malice.  
"Pads, is that you?" Prongs has stuck his head out of the cave and is peering into the gloom. He can't see as well as either the wolf or Padfoot, not even with his silly glasses. The wolf swivels around silently, growling. _SHUT UP, YOU TOSSER_, Padfoot thinks desperately.

"Padfoot!" Prongs calls out into the shadows. He can see the wolf now. He thinks it is Padfoot, which is stupid because the wolf is much bigger and greyer than Padfoot and smells all wrong. It is especially stupid because Padfoot does not usually want to rip Prongs's throat out and feast on his entrails, and that is quite obviously the wolf's main objective. "Padfoot! Stop being an idiot and come inside with us, alright? I'm sorry I was such an arse about Remus."

The wolf tenses, preparing to spring.

"Don't be mad at me, mate," says Prongs the world's biggest idiot. "Go find your clothes and change back, okay?" He peers at the wolf, not unkindly. "Okay?"

The wolf jumps.

Padfoot roars, and leaps out of the bush, colliding with the wolf and knocking it sideways. After picking itself up, it snarls horribly and charges at Padfoot, knocking him on his back. The wolf lunges at Padfoot's neck, and Padfoot scrabbles helplessly with his paws, trying to push him off.

Evans is screaming solidly, the exact note of A flat.

Prongs is shouting, and Wormtail is whimpering, and there is the sound of Snape throwing up and trying to say something panicked at the same time. Padfoot is grappling with the wolf, and sinking his teeth deep into his wiry fur, and although the Sirius part of him feels revolted at tasting his best friend's blood, it's oddly satisfying.

Evans has stopped shrieking like a banshee and has run to the mouth of the cave and Prongs is trying to make her go back inside. Snape and Wormtail join her, and they're all tussling with each other, but Padfoot can't see whether they're helping Prongs with Evans, or trying to escape. The wolf hears the noise and starts to run towards them, but Padfoot jumps on his back and drags the beast a few feet away. He doesn't know if any of them have seen him.

Padfoot is losing the fight, though, because the wolf is larger and stronger and quicker with his teeth than he is. The moon is glaring in the sky like a torchlight, and suddenly Padfoot feels sharp teeth lift him by the scruff of the neck and dash his head against a tree. He crumples to the ground, and the wolf turns, slavering, onto the others, watching it advance stupidly from the cave mouth. Padfoot observes this muggily, unable to get up.

There is a flash of light, so bright that it can't be anything other than white, and a loud CRACK, and all at once there is a woman standing there with her hair in a bun, and she sees the wolf and begins to scream a series of discordant notes, and next to her is a tall man with a white beard and purple shorts who is carrying a wand and waving it through the air and there is another CRACK and –

Padfoot faints.

A resounding slap across the face was not one of Sirius's most favourite ways to be woken up after a late night. Regardless of this, he was roused in exactly this way - not by just _one_ such blow, but several, raining down on his cheeks and stinging him awake. It was the morning after – Sirius could tell that from the harsh grey light and the headache. But the morning after what? Twin cockatiels chirped merrily in a branch hanging low above him, and it all came flooding back: the ropes, the moon, the wolf – Remus. Sirius had changed into Padfoot and tried to stop Moony going for the others before he'd blacked out. Sirius had taken on his Animagus form, which meant that he was now… he felt an insect of some sort scuttle over his bare thigh. His _bare _thigh. Bugger and fuck.

Suddenly realizing that the slaps probably wouldn't cease until he opened his eyes, Sirius did so. His assailant turned out to be someone who, Sirius wouldn't have been surprised, had wanted to give him a good slapping for a long, long time.

"Evans," Sirius said pleasantly.

"Black," Lily replied. She looked terribly solemn. Sirius tried not to let the fact that he was not wearing a stitch of clothing bother him. Lily was wearing a grim, set expression, and her green eyes were trained on his face. Either she was choosing to ignore the fact that Sirius was as naked as a peeled potato, or she simply hadn't noticed yet.

"Dumbledore? I thought I saw," Sirius mumbled slowly, sitting up casually and crossing one leg over the other – quite subtly, he thought.

"He's here," Lily nodded, affirming this.

"With Remus?"

"Yes."

"Ah."

"S'all good," Lily slurred, waving her hands in the air and smiling bitterly. Sirius grinned back at her in a friendly manner, trying to ignore the persistent throbbing at the base of his skull. Monosyllaballic conversations were the best kind.

"Alright?" Sirius inquired.

"He'll live," Lily answered.

"Which way?"

"There," Lily said, pointing through the thin line of trees to the beach.

"Must see him," Sirius muttered, trying to rip a leaf from a branch to retain his modesty with. It crumpled into damp fragments. He grasped another one, then wiped his hand in disgust as yellow bug slime oozed onto it. Lily made a 'tch' sound with her tongue.

"You're naked."

"I know," Sirius said in frustration. "I've got to see – if he's okay." Lily sighed, then pushed a crinkled wad of black clothing into Sirius's lap.

"My robes. Take them."

"Nice one," Sirius said gratefully. He pulled them over his head and Lily, to her credit, didn't wince when the fabric stretched dangerously over his shoulders. Sirius rose to a standing position, his legs still a bit wobbly. "Thank you very much, Evans." He paused. "Are _you_ OK?"

"Surviving," Lily answered, then smiled broadly. Sirius was glad of that. She'd looked as if she was about to kill something, a few seconds earlier. "Thank you very much, Sirius."

It was the first time he could remember her ever saying his first name. He gaped unattractively for a few seconds, then remembered that keeping one's mouth so wide open that you could stable Thestrals in it was often considered impolite.

"I should be the one thanking you – for the clothes…"

"No," Lily said, shaking her head. "Thank you, Sirius. For everything."

Sirius nodded dumbly and staggered through the trees, wearing Lily's black robes. They were about three sizes too small, loose where he didn't need them to be and tight where he'd rather they weren't. As he pushed through the herbaceous border separating the forest from the sand, he saw a limp figure – Remus! – lying on the sand, his head being propped up by Peter. A woman – Pomfrey, it looked like – was trying to force a drink down his throat, but Remus shook his head and coughed, spilling the orange liquid onto his chest.

"Mr Black," a voice said coolly. Sirius span around to see Dumbledore, wearing what seemed to be an intrepid jungle explorer outfit, only purple, with silver stitching. He was flanked on either side by James and Snape. They both looked blankly at him. Snape had the remnants of vomit on the front of his shirt, and James looked as bad as Sirius felt. Sirius tried to make eye-contact with James, who was as focussed and expressionless as a blank piece of parchment. _I'm sorry, Jamie_.

_It's OK_, James mouthed at him. _It's fine_.

"I'm sorry," Sirius whispered, not realizing he was speaking aloud. Dumbledore, who seemed to think he was the one being addressed, folded his arms over his chest wearily. Sirius looked up and down at his Headmaster, slightly disconcerted. It was quite unnerving to have the existence of Dumbledore's legs clarified. They had all naturally assumed he had them – after all, gliding everywhere would be extremely tiresome – but actually _seeing_ them in the flesh, as it were, was a bit of a shock.

"I will assume that Miss Evans has informed you then, of your part in this?"

"My part in what?" Sirius responded, distracted. He glanced down the beach, where Remus was having another coughing fit. He had no shirt on, and was wearing the cord trousers he'd worn to the island. Peter was clapping him on the back like an idiot, forgetting that the skin there would probably be sensitive after the night's transformation.

"Patience, Mr Black," Dumbledore smiled knowingly. If he felt any wonder at seeing Sirius in a girl's Prefect's robes two sizes too small for him, he didn't express it. "Mr Potter and Mr Snape have just finished telling me how you all occupied your time here, and though there are variations in the retelling, I feel I have a roughly accurate portrayal of what happened. Although Mr Lupin is a little worse for the wear, there is nothing seriously wrong with him. You may go and comfort him - once we have discussed the incidence that brought you here, and naturally, your punishment."

"Punishment?" Sirius asked, nonplussed.

"It was your fault," Snape snarled, stepping forward and poking Sirius hard in the chest. He clearly knew nothing of the part Sirius had played in preventing him from being _mauled_ the night before, which was comforting, if a bit annoying on the emotional blackmail front. "You lot and your stupid bloody _pranks_ got us here."

"I don't remember," Sirius said with complete honesty. "I can't remember anything at all about the night before we found ourselves on the island."

"Liar," Snape huffed, but Dumbledore pulled him back firmly.

"Mr Snape, as we already discussed, the potency of the magic involved – and the haphazard way the boys invoked it - will have inevitably caused a mild _Obliviate_-like effect on all those concerned. For instance, you yourself have professed to have no recollection of exactly why you were in the Gryffindor wing of the castle that night."

"_You_ were in our common room?" Sirius exclaimed, enraged. "Sliming up our sofas and getting grease on our cushions?"

"Worse," James cut in immediately. "He was in our _dorm_. And he's pretending he doesn't know how he got there."

Sirius looked at Snape in consternation. The Slytherin boy's gaunt, sallow face twitched for a second or two, then he shrugged.

"I expect you four brought me there as well," Snape answered suddenly. "Seeing as you apparently engineered this whole thing."

"Why would we _willingly_ bring _you_ within two hundred feet of the place we sleep at night?" Sirius retorted. Dumbledore coughed masterfully.

"Since all six of you seem to be suffering from collective amnesia, I will fill you in on the details, in the hope that they jog your memories. The night you six disappeared, your dormitory, James and Sirius, was left in a state of utter disarray. The house-elves sent to clean it also found initially incongruous mugs with what seemed to be traces of alcoholic beverages left in them. I am sure you are as perplexed to hear this news as I am, as I am certain that no sixth-year students of mine would _dare_ to become inebriated and disorderly on school grounds."

Slightly faded memories flashed back into Sirius's mind. There _had_ been a lot of booze, actually. Peter had managed to steal a huge bottle of gin from Professor Keyes's study when he'd been called in there about not handing in his History of Magic coursework, they hadn't finished the Firewhiskey left over from Ogden's surprise birthday party, and Remus had received about a litre of vodka in the post that morning from a distant uncle he'd never realized he had. It was like a sign from Heaven, written with clouds in angels' handwriting: _GET DRUNK_. Sirius and James had had to take drastic action to prevent Remus from handing the whole lot into the teachers – which meant, of course, "destroying the evidence" by drinking it all in one night. They even woke up Peter, who'd been planning on having an early night, for this exact purpose.

"Among the many and varied objects strewn over the beds and floor," Dumbledore continued smoothly, "were several large textbooks on Advanced Magic, one particular tome being from the Restricted Section, although I understand that Mr. Lupin had borrowed it legitimately from the librarian, for the extension on his Charms coursework."

Remus had been being boring, Sirius remembered. He'd been nursing a tumbler of gin – and how _could_ you nurse gin, James had lamented, when the whole point was to down it in one go – and Remus was _reading_, reading, reading and not having fun at all. Sirius had wanted him to have fun, so he'd pulled the book out of his hands and had Peter sit on his stomach until he agreed to get pissed with the rest of them. Then James had snatched the book and demanded to know what on earth about it was so interesting. He tried to read it upside down, before realizing his mistake and tossing a mug at Sirius's head when he laughed. Sirius had been drenched in vodka, and he'd had to take off his shirt.

"It is of my understanding that you attempted one of the spells in this book," Dumbledore said, a glint of something that could almost have been pride in his eyes. "I am astounded as to how you managed to – as you boys say – _pull it off_, as such an incantation requires a great source of innate magical power. I can only assume more than one of you was involved."

Sirius and James had started reading one of the passages, laughing in hysteria and cackling like demented hens because one of the Latin words apparently sounded like 'wanker'. Peter had joined in, but his pronunciation was terrible, and Remus, who'd been watching wryly and looking pained every time Pete made a 'v' sound, had shown them how to say it properly, although James was slurring so much it was of little use.

"We ascertained the next day that you were missing," Dumbledore said. "Although, as it was a weekend, and young boys are known for their tendency to sleep late, your absence at breakfast was not unusual. However, what _was_ unusual, the other Gryffindor sixth-years told me, was the fact that your dormitory smelt not of the 'usual' dirty laundry, but something much _stronger_, and there was a type of _slime_ pooling out from under the doorway, a thing I am presently baffled as to the reason for."

"What colour was the slime?" James interjected. Dumbledore raised a perfectly white eyebrow.

"I do beg your pardon, Mr Potter?"

"What colour?" James repeated. "Was it green or brown? Was it the squidgy kind or the oozy kind?"

"It was teal, I believe," Dumbledore answered seriously. "And from Mr. Longbottom's report I can draw the conclusion that it squidged. He seems to hold little regard for your hygiene, as when I questioned him he said that he thought you were merely 'doing something disgusting in there again'."

"Good old Frankie," Sirius grinned.

"If it was squidgy teal slime, it was a Zonko's product, Professor," James informed the Headmaster knowingly. Snape made a hideous face.

"Am I to understand that you accidentally set off one of your amusing booby traps in your own dormitory?" Dumbledore inquired with astonishing interest.

"No, of course not," James retorted, puffing himself up. "Only amateurs use mass-produced slime, like the type you get in Hogsmeade. It's better when it oozes, so we make all our own, unless it's the quality pack from larger branches." He beamed, although Sirius doubted that Dumbledore would be impressed that James was a discerning shopper when it came to using slime. Snape also looked less than happy.

"It might certainly explain why either Severus or Lily was in the vicinity of your dormitory that night," Dumbledore conceded, twiddling his beard. "It seems that the six students within an oddly _specific_ radius were transported here. However, with regards to the slime; it saddens me that my senior students have to resort to such childish methods when dealing with each other – however vitriolic the feud might be."

"Lily would never do that," James protested. "She'd never sink that low."

"I didn't put slime in their dormitory, Professor!" Snape protested in indignation. "I don't even remember how I got there, remember? And even if I did slime them, I rather think the people who brought me here against my will and nearly got me killed should be brought to justice."

"I quite agree," Dumbledore said. "When we return to Hogwarts, Mr. Lupin and Miss Evans will both undergo 20 hours of detention, effective immediately. Mr Pettigrew shall perform 30 hours of the same, and you three shall all spend 50 hours' worth of detention and service to the school before this little matter is forgotten."

"Professor!" The three boys chorused in unison. Snape looked as if he'd swallowed an unripe lemon, one that was twice as sour as normal and riddled with flesh-eating maggots.

"That's not fair–"

"It is extremely fair, Mr. Potter, and fairer than you deserve."

"How come the girl and the werewolf got off easiest?"

"Miss Evans is an innocent party in this situation, and did not court trouble and disaster by provoking these boys with slime, Mr. Snape," Dumbledore answered curtly. "Mr. Lupin is having his prefect's badge removed formally once we return to school."

"Why?" Sirius asked angrily. "He's a great prefect."

"He's a great prefect, and he let you guys drink and abuse powerful magic in the _dormitory_?" Snape questioned sarcastically. "Oh, he's _great_, alright. Sure."

"I will have no more questions about my decisions or motives," Dumbledore announced, eyeing them all beadily. "As delighted as I am to find you all more or less intact, you must know that you are very much in disgrace. If I were you, I would accept my punishment gracefully, and restrain yourselves from attacking one another until it is time to Portkey back. Now, if you have any miscellaneous questions, I will be all too willing to answer them."

"Do our parents know we're here?" Snape blurted out. Dumbledore's forehead went creased – more than it had been already, that is. His eyes were bright, and reflected the brilliant blue of the ocean he was staring at, but the lines on his face became more noticeable all of a sudden.

"They know," Dumbledore breathed heavily. "However, they have not been filled in on all of the details. The Minister and myself fabricated a slight tale to prevent them from worrying – a school trip gone awry, I recall. They should not be fretting greatly over your return."

Sirius was going to ask the next question, but James beat him to it.

"May we use the detentions to catch up on the work we missed, sir?"

"Although I suspect classes were inordinately more pleasurable for your Professors when you were away, you shall spend your detentions aiding them in dogsbody work as an apology," Dumbledore said with amusement. "Madame Pomfrey also insists that you research and write a twelve-roll essay on the harmful effects of alcohol and underage sexual activity, to be handed in to her by the end of the month." He paused, and looked straight at Sirius. "I believe you had a question, Mr. Black?"

"Oh, yes," Sirius breathed. "Could I – can I go and see Remus, please?"

Dumbledore smiled.

"Why, of course."

"Where are the contraceptives I issued you with?" Pomfrey asked primly, when Sirius ran up to where she, Remus and Peter were huddled on the beach. She was examining Peter's tongue with distaste, which had been stained bright yellow from the sherbet. Remus watched the waves crash on the shore from where he sat glumly on the sand.

"We don't have them anymore," Sirius answered, startled.

"_Oh_," Pomfrey answered disapprovingly, whilst expertly checking inside Peter's ears. Sirius couldn't understand why anyone would do this unless they were deeply interested in candle making. There was certainly nothing in there apart from an abundance of wax, and, as many of his Professors speculated, a direct passage to the opposite ear, which was the reason why so much of their information seemed to bypass his brain.

"I mean, we lost them," Sirius amended, as Pomfrey nodded curtly at Peter, who shut his mouth abruptly. "We didn't use any; we just lost them in the storm."

"I see," Pomfrey replied, shutting her First Aid kit with a menacing snap. "I do hope that those are the only things you teenagers have _lost_ on your little holiday." She turned to Peter. "You, boy, take me directly to Miss Evans so I can check up on her. Has she been exhibiting any symptoms of nausea, depression, sensitivity to smells? Hmm?"

"Er," Peter said dully. "Maybe?"

"Disgraceful," Pomfrey said, sniffing and standing up. "Utterly disgraceful. I'm surprised you're not all dying of scurvy – or malaria – or STIs."

"STIs?" Peter asked, confused.

"Sexually transmitted infections," Pomfrey clarified. "Genital warts. Chlamydia. Gonorrhoea. Crabs."

"We do have crabs," Peter nodded. "I killed one so we could eat –"

"Could I talk to Remus, please?" Sirius interrupted. Pomfrey, who had been wearing an expression of mingled horror and disgust, softened it to one of vague sympathy.

"Of course you can. Just as long as you don't exhaust him. We'll be leaving soon." She swooped off, Peter trotting eagerly at her heels and offering more crab anecdotes – "when we first got here I thought weeing on them would kill them, but it didn't work". Sirius sidled over towards Remus, who had his back to everything, and sat down, slinging an arm around him. They sat there in silence for about a minute, staring at the waves. Remus's back was hot, but his body felt so weakened that Sirius could almost feel the boy's heartbeat reverberating through him.

"How are you feeling?" Sirius asked uselessly.

"Have you ever been beaten senseless by a fat, drunk man called Trevor, and then used as a bouncy castle for an obese hippogriff, and then been given a full-body massage from a bad-tempered porcupine with samurai knives attached to its paws, and then run laps constantly until even your teeth are tired?"

"No," Sirius mumbled, stroking Remus's forearm. "Neither have you."

"Your point, Mr. Black?" Remus answered, in a fair imitation of a professor. He rotated his ankle gingerly. "Pomfrey just fixed my foot for me. I broke it."

"Well, aren't you happy that that hasn't actually happened to you?" Sirius asked. "The whole samurai porcupine Olympic run thing?"

"Mmmph," Remus pondered, entwining his hand with Sirius's and squeezing it. "It'd probably hurt less."

They stared at the waves again.

"Why is Dumbledore taking away your Prefectdom?"

"Oh, _that_," Remus grinned weakly. "I told him I tried to get free after Snape tied me up."

"What?" Sirius leant back, appalled.

"I did, you know," Remus laughed dryly, then winced and put a hand to his ribs. "I nearly killed my wrist doing it, too. Nearly killed you all, it turns out. Bloody stupid thing to do."

"That wasn't you! That was _me_, and I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."

"Come again?"

"That was me," Sirius said again, feeling guilty. "I loosened your ropes once you fell asleep. I didn't know – I didn't think – I didn't know it would jeopardize your Prefectness." Remus stared incredulously up at Sirius, who had the distinct feeling that he was either babbling or sounding idiotic. Possibly both.

"Why on earth did you do that?"

"They were cutting into you," Sirius said lamely. Remus whistled in amazement.

"And the prize for the number one reckless and spontaneous random action goes to… Sirius Black."

"I'll tell Dumbledore, and he'll give it back. You can't be… un-Prefectified on my account."

"I was a terrible Prefect," Remus shook his head dismissively. "I didn't socialise with the majority of the student population, I let you drink _gin_, I smoked in the dorm, I let you stuff Dungbombs into Snape's cauldron in Potions, I let James try and imitate that stunt flyer he saw in Quidditch Weekly, I let Peter eat soap to see if he could blow bubbles out of his mouth, I was too scared of the third-years to stop them climbing on the trees in the grounds, and I _lost my badge_ on the very first week because I thought you would call me a tosser for wearing it all the time."

"But –"

"I don't _care_, Sirius," Remus said softly, his voice sounding hoarse. "I'm just glad that no-one got badly hurt. Except you, really. James told me I hammered Padfoot into a tree. I think you might be concussed from that - you sound it."

Sirius swivelled round to face Remus, and looked at him hard. He traced the sides of a shallow cut on Remus's side with his finger, brushing the sand away from it with his thumb. Little tremors shuddered in Remus's chest when he did that.

"Does it hurt?"

"N-no," Remus forced out from behind gritted teeth. "It doesn't – _hurt_."

Sirius traced down Remus's side and across his stomach, avoiding the slashes made by the wolf and the trees. One large wound, above and to the left of Remus's navel, was bandaged. Sirius traced around it gingerly and up his friend's chest, over Remus's hurdling heartbeat, where the skin seemed to vibrate as he breathed, circling around his nipples and travelling down again, dipping inside his bellybutton and coming to rest on the slightly raised skin of his appendix scar.

"That hurt?"

"Nuh," Remus managed, as Sirius's fingers trailed round the waistband of his corduroys and inchingly crept up the small of his back. "No, it doesn't hurt."

Sirius's hands travelled up his shoulders, one curling around his neck and smoothing his collarbone, the other feeling the contours of his face. His finger stroked across Remus's cheek and onto his mouth, where his lower lip was slightly cut on one side.

"_That_ hurts," Sirius said questioningly, as he pressed down on the nick gently. Remus nodded in confirmation. "Do you want me to kiss it better?"

Sirius leaned forward without waiting for an answer and kissed him, his hands supporting and tilting the other boy's head. Remus tasted soft and sleepy and slightly metallic because of the blood, and it felt like they were melting into each other.

"Ha," Sirius said, disengaging himself after a while. "Your tongue's not tired."

He always had to go and say the stupidest things at times like these, didn't he. Sirius winced at himself, and Remus smiled.

"I said even my _teeth_ were tired," Remus corrected. "And they are. Exhausted."

"Is that why you were nibbling on my lip, then?" Sirius asked. He grinned. "You also said you had been massaged by a sadist porcupine called Trevor."

"Trevor was the fat, drunk man who beat me senseless," Remus reminded him. "You are hopeless at this."

"I'm not hopeless at other things," smiled Sirius wickedly. Remus tried to raise an eyebrow, but found it to be too heavy, eventually giving it up and letting it drop.

"Anyhow," he yawned, "as much as I'd like to discover what you're not hopeless at, we're in already in trouble up to our ears. And I wouldn't want to traumatize Snape."

"Or Peter."

"Or Pomfrey."

"She'd love it," Sirius joked. "Filthy-minded little wench."

They stared out at the sea again. The waves lapped soothingly at the shore in a rhythmic lullaby, and the yellow sun hung low in the sky, the glaring white moon of the night forgotten. Two brown-backed crabs scuttled purposefully along the coastline, one holding a bit of bark from the fallen tree in its pincers.

"You know, I don't want to leave," Remus murmured.

On the day of their departure, the island looked almost exactly like it did on their arrival. The sun shone down on everything, the reflected hues making the island a technicolour of crazy. The parrots in the trees squawked fit to bust, strolling with their nuts as if the branches were an avine model's runway. The devastation from the storm had all but vanished. The perfect beaches glimmered palely, the fallen trunks in the sun looking as if they had lain there for a thousand years, and then some.

Only the people were different. Their hair was a little longer than before, and roguishly tousled – "matted", Pomfrey had said. Their skin darker from the sun – and covered with a delightfully musky layer of sweat, dirt and sand. Lastly, they all had the slightly haunted look of people who have experienced withdrawal symptoms from the additives, preservatives and E numbers that normal people are used to ingesting in their food.

James was managing to stand next to Lily, with his arms around her, and yet he wasn't acting like an idiot. He was also managing not to punch Snape in the nose, who was standing next to him also, though that may have been due to the fact that teachers were extremely in evidence. Lily, having managed to assure Pomfrey that no, she was not pregnant, unless it was some sort of immaculate conception, was also visibly more relaxed. She seemed to have decided that life had thrown every possible hurdle it _could_ throw at her, and so she leaned into James's chest, smiling serenely. Peter, who seemed to be revelling in the fact that Lily wasn't pressing her lips together in annoyance every time he said something, was talking animatedly to Snape, who, rather than sneering, was tolerating it, albeit reluctantly. Sirius and Remus weren't looking at each other, but Sirius's right hand and Remus's left one were oddly absent from view. They both wore distracted smiles on their faces.

"Are you children ready?" Dumbledore called, from where he had unfurled the mauve parasol they were using as a Portkey. "Gather round."

"I hate you all," Snape snarled suddenly, interrupting Peter in his chatter. "I hate you all so much. You're the most annoying, stupid, immature people I could ever hope to be trapped on an island with. This changes nothing."

"Well done, Snivellus," James congratulated him, amused. "That was a very eloquent speech you just made."

"This changes nothing with us, either," Lily said suddenly, disentangling herself from James's embrace. "I am never going out with you, Potter. Not in a million years."

"Oh, you wound me," James murmured, still irreverent and cheerful, despite his rejection. "When we are happily married and you are hula dancing for me in a grass skirt and coconut bra to remind me of this day, you will apologise for being so cruel."

Lily raised an eyebrow slightly at the strange, foreign, impostor James who _wasn't_ falling over himself to plead for her undying love.

"You will soon learn that I am never going to hula dance for you, Potter," she said, composing herself. "And I don't care how many times I have to slime your dormitory for you to get the message."

"That was _you_?" James and Snape chorused in disbelief. Lily tossed her head enigmatically, and marched over the sand to the Portkey, smiling at Dumbledore, who inclined his head gracefully, his silver beard bobbing up and down.

"You know something, guys?" James breathed, once he was able to speak again. "I love her even more _now_. That's so… it's so unbelievably _sexy_ of her."

The others, not willing to discuss slime's merits as a potential aphrodisiac, walked off towards the parasol, and James followed, shaking his head with a mixture of lust and incredulity. Everyone grabbed onto the handle, or a bit of lace.

"This is a really cool Portkey, Professor," Peter commented, fingering the material.

"Thank you, Mr Pettigrew," Dumbledore answered, pleased. "It was just lying around the office; you know how it is…"

Remus didn't know how it was, but wisely decided not to contribute to the conversation. He looked over his shoulder, and looked into Sirius's wicked grey eyes.

"Your eyes are so close," Sirius muttered. Dumbledore was talking to Peter about his detention, and Pomfrey was re-clarifying that none of them were pregnant, so no-one heard.

"Sorry," Remus apologised, and rolled his. "I was meaning to do something about that, I just never got round to it."

"I like them close," Sirius said. "But I think maybe they're just big. You have big brown eyes, like melting chocolate drops. Or mud."

"Thank you," Remus grinned, blinking.

"I love your muddy eyes," Sirius said suddenly. Remus stopped blinking.

"I love your…" He trailed off. Sirius pouted like a toddler who was being refused an ice-cream cone with spinach and hairgel as toppings.

"That hard to flatter, am I?"

"You," Remus blurted out.

"You love my me?" Sirius asked, smiling.

"Yes," Remus nodded. "Exactly."

"Do you want to hear a joke?" Peter almost shouted. "There was a pirate, and he woke up one morning on an island. And on this island the sea was purple, and the trees were purple, and the sand was purple, and the animals were all purple. And the pirate captain, he looks around at the island and says… 'Oh dear, I think I've been marooned'."

As Peter's hysterical laughter filled the air, there was a sudden yank behind Remus's navel. Peter's laugh stopped abruptly and the world began to whirl madly, like a spinning top. There was a cool rush of air and the mad postcard colours all blurred into each other.

"Oh, I get it," Remus said aloud. "Maroon is purple."

And then, they were gone.

_Fin_

* * *

**The ending.**

Crap.  
Shite.  
Worthless.  
You have low self-esteem.  
You're fishing for compliments.

**Favourite cameo character. Because I am LAME like that.**

The cannibalistic owl.  
The crabs.  
The fleet of porpoises that rescued everyone else on the island so that Sirius and Remus could stay together and have fluffy, sandy boysex. Whoops, that scene was cut.  
Er. Pomfrey?

**Did the votes go in your favour?**

Everything I wished for came true!  
This is exactly why I didn't vote in the real election. One vote can't make a difference.  
You looked at what I wanted and deliberately wrote the opposite. Fie!  
No, but I liked the stuff that people voted for.  
Yes, but you cocked great opportunities up each time.


End file.
